Lucifer's tale
by Lucifer-Allheart
Summary: A man that has adopted the name of Lucifer wakes up on Hyda IV after a near death experiance. Having no memories, he finds himself wrapped up in Fayt's adventure as he desperately tries to unravel his past and find the truth about himself.
1. i'll tell you what happend

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Ocean or any of it's chars.

I know that this chapter is quit short and probably doesn't interest most of you. I promise that later on the story gets better. Also please excuse me if I made the dialogues annoying in any way. Tell me so and I'll try to adjust it to make this story as easy readable as possible.

Now I'll go on with the first chapter of: Lucifer's Tale(I need to think of a better name for this story. Suggestions are welcome.)

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Chapter 1: I'll tell you what happened

Allow me to introduce myself before going on with telling you what has happened to me all my life. Well if you'd call 4 weeks a real 'life'. I know it sound weird but my body is actually 18 years of age, according to the investigation that was done.

And in the last week of my live I've been going through a lot. First I was attacked by an alien force, then I got on a space ship and now I'm in an escape pod that's about to crash-land in the middle of a city.

Allow me to tell you why I say that I've only lived for 4 weeks. I still don't know exactly who I am, or where I was born. I don't even remember my parents. I don't remember anything before 'that' day.

The first thing I've seen that I can remember was fire. I woke up in the middle of a fire. Next to me there was some kind of crater. I heard voices coming from around the bushes. A man and woman were talking. "That was REALLLLLY close to hit. It only landed 200 meters away from us. We should go buy a lottery ticket dear" a man's voice said.

"What are you talking about? Why should we buy a lottery ticket?" a female voice answered.

"Because we're really lucky it seems!" the man answered, laughing at his own joke.. After hearing their voices I tried to call them only to find out that my voice didn't work very well.

"Wait a second dear, did you hear that?" the woman said.

As I looked up a saw a man and a woman standing above me. The woman had blue hair and was wearing a straw hat. They looked very shocked to find me. Before I passed out I could hear someone yell:

"HEY GOT A DOCTOR OVER HERE. THERE'S SOMEONE INJUR….." And after that everything went black.

When I woke up again I was in a hospital. I looked around and immediately fell pain running through my entire body. I looked down and saw that my entire body was covert in bandages. I was seriously injured and yet I felt pretty good (although I couldn't move around at all).

I heard a door open and a nurse can in my sight. She wasn't very good looking nor was she very ugly yet there was something about here that I just couldn't stop looking at. She had a third eye on her forehead. She didn't seem too surprised about it though.

"Excuse me sir, how are you feeling?" she asked me.

"I don't feel too bad but if look at my body I can see that I am in a very bad state right now." I said.

"Yes you were very lucky that those people were just walking by. If they hadn't been there you would have died from blood loss."

"Do you know what happened? I don't seem to remember it. All I remember is seeing fire around me."

"Yes of course sir, it's not too strange that you don't remember. It was actually a miracle that you're still alive after what happened. A few hours ago a huge meteor came into the gravitational field of this planet, Hydra IV. It got drawn to the planet and was on a collision course with the planet. That is of course no big deal because most of the meteor burned up in the atmosphere of the planet. It happens all the time. However this time the core of the meteorite was made up of metal and that didn't burn completely. A small piece of it was left intact and hit the ground about 200 meters away from the beach." She spoke calmy, in a voice that was very soothing.

"A place where you were standing. The meteor core landed 10 meters away from you and due to the small distance you were hit by the impact"

"I see. I really am lucky then, for surviving a smash like that so close to me."

"Yes indeed. Your body has impressive stamina and strength. Are you playing a lot of those VR games or something? Nevermind that. On to the reason that I was actually coming here for when you woke up."

She said before her voice changed to a professional tone, that was less soothing, yet still extremely calm. "Do you remember anything at al from before the crash? Your name, family or Homeplanet?" she asked me.

"No I don't remember anything at all from before the crash. I don't know who I am, where I'm from or why I'm here." I said after a few moments of thinking.

It was strange how calm I was even though I was seriously injured and didn't know anything about myself.

"it's alright." the nurse said. "It's not unusual to get amnesia from a shock like that. Don't worry you'll get your memory back in time." She said.

"But for now you need your rest. Take a nap." After saying that she left the room leaving me alone. I quickly fell asleep.

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first chapter has be changed so that you can read it more easily, hope you like it more this way. and of course please Revieuw 


	2. i'll tel you some more

Disclaimer: I do not own Star Ocean Till the end of time or any of the other things in this story. The only thing I DO own are the OC's name and character design.(not that it's worth much but whatever).

I know the last chapter was pretty short and probably pretty boring, but I promise you that that'll improve over time. This chapter has a fight scene in it so that already makes up for a lot.(I think).

Now we begin with chapter two of: Lucifer's Tale (I really need to think of another name)

Chapter 2: I'll tell you some more

When I woke up from my nap it was already 5 in the afternoon. The nurse with the 3 eyes came back in and said that I had visitors. Following here came in the two people who I saw on the beach, followed by a boy around my length with blue hair and a younger girl with long brown hair.

"These are the people who found you after the meteor impact. They were worried about you. I'll leave you alone now" she said as she left the room.

"Greeting. I am Professor Robert Leingod" the man introduced himself to me.

"This is my wife Ryoko, my son Fayt and my neighbor Sophia Esteed." he said as he pointed to the blue haired woman who was still wearing her straw hat, the blue haired boy and the brown haired girl.

"We heard about your amnesia. I hope you memory returns to you soon" Ryoko said.

We then talked for a long time.it turned out that Mr. and Mrs. Leingod were both famous researchers, Sophia was a symbological genetics student and Fayt was a gaming and sports addict. they left late around 9 in the evening, giving me their best wishes.

After about 2 weeks of rest in the hospital I was almost completely recovered. My memory was still not returning to me and because I was also not registered in the resort, that didn't help me find out my name. I was staying in a room that the hotel had offered me for free as long as I was recovering.

1 day, about 1 week after I recovered, I met Fayt and Sophia in the hallway. They were walking out of a room from where a little girl called something about a show of some sorts.

"He, look who we have here. How're you doing?" Fayt asked me.

"I'm doing great, just annoyed that I don't know my name. And you guys?" I answered.

"We're just walking around the hotel for a bit, what were you going to do?" Sophia asked me.

"I was planning on using one of those combat simulators. They're about the only thing that I haven't tried yet here."

"ALRIGHT!" Fayt yelled suddenly "We'll go with you. I also wanted to try those thing out."

"But Fayt, you promised me that we'd spent the rest of the day together!" Sophia complained, sticking out her lower lip and looking a bit angry.

"then why don't you join us Sophia?" I said.

"But it's one of those combat simulators. You have to actually fight in there don't you? I don't like those kind of things" she complained.

It took us another 5 minutes of persuading to get her to join us in the simulator. In there the computer started the program automatically and selected the characters that each of us used. I was most surprised when I heard my character's name.

Player 1: Fayt Leingod

Character: Sword master Adonis Klein

Player level: AAA

Player 2: Sophia Esteed

Character: Flare Witch Cecilia Femina

Player level: E

Player 3: name not known

Character: custom character. Sword fighter Lucifer Allheart

Player level: AAA

"Now hold on a minute, you have a custom character and your player level AAA? That's unbelievable! Custom chars are extremely hard to use because they don't have any beginning skills." Fayt looked at me with big eyes when he said that.

"I don't know I didn't even knew I had a char made. Let's just go on with the fight. Computer, start the simulation." I said ordering the computer to activate the battle.

Immediately there were holograms appearing all over the room and the also changed our clothing. Fayt had gained armor around his legs, torso and shoulders, while Sophia gained some sort of dress of armor.

My armor was very strange. It was not as thick as Sophia's or Fayt's and was put only on my torso, lower arms and lower legs. On my wrist appeared a long thin katana. It was obvious that my character was made for being swift rather then strong or capable of taking a good hit. It didn't really matter because this was, after al, a simulation.

The monsters soon appeared in the room as well. They were also holograms and looked something like huge bugs or something. As soon as the fight started Fayt and I drew our swords. We rushed in at the bugs while Sophia hit them from a distance with her Symbologie.

Both Fayt and I killed a bug instantly when Sophia hit them with her strange ball of light thing(I supposed that was what was called Symbologie) all it took was 1 stab through their heads to kill them. The third one was no different. Except for the fact that Fayt and I killed it together. It's head went flying. The battle was over in mere seconds.

The computer then started the second battle. This time around there were some bats but again Sophia smashed them out of the air for Fayt to finish of. However I was surrounded by 3 other bats that Sophia couldn't attack because she might hit me. I took my sword in both hands, placed it to my left side, and as the bats came in for a massive attack from multible directions, I swung the sword around to the right and spinned with it.

Hitting them all at once and cutting them clearly in half. The fight was once again over in a few seconds and the third fight begun.

This time around the monsters were a lot stronger. There was also a really big _thing_ with them. He did something to make spikes shoot up from the ground. Fayt and I were able to jump aside from it because we were warriors but Sophia wasn't as lucky.

She got the full blast from the attack and got pierced by the spikes. She was immediately kicked out of the game due to death. Fayt and I had to take care of the big thing and the 2 bugs without her help. For that we had to split up so the enemy had to do the same. Fayt got the big thing after him and I got the bugs.

By spinning around the moment they were near me I killed them with 1 slash. When I looked at Fayt however I saw that the big thing had punched him with it's massive fist, knocking Fayt out.

'So' I thought 'I have to fight the damn thing alone. But unlike the other monsters this thing didn't seem to have a 1 hit kill spot like the bugs and bats. This might be tough'

As I charged in to attack him I could suddenly saw him move extremely slow. He was swinging his arm around to strike me but I saw it happen so slow I had enough time to jump right over his attack, and slashed his arm of.

After that I saw a wide opening to attack him. I stuck my sword right in the middle of his now open shoulder and killed him with the stab. When the simulation ended I saw both Fayt and Sophia look at me in great surprise.

"That was amazing!" Fayt said "how on earth did you respond so quick? That guy swung at you with now warning but you simply jumped over his attack as if it wasn't even there. I've never seen anyone react so fast before." As we went on talking there was suddenly a huge shockwave throughout the entire room.


	3. Vendeeni attack

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Ocean or any of it's chars.

Chapter 3: Vendeeni attack. There goes my free vacation.

When the shock was over Fayt asked the computer to tell him what was going on. "This is an emergency alert. Hyda IV is currently under attack by unidentified spacecraft. All civilians should follow immediate evacuation instructions on the nearest console. I repeat: All civilians..." The automatic voice of the computer replied.

"What the…"I yelled as another shockwave could be felt. "We're under attack?"

"Let's hurry to the evacuation shelter" Fayt said.

Immediately he three of us ran for it towards the teleporter. As we ran towards the teleporter we could see the damage that the shock had done to the building. There were pieces of the walls torn down al over the place.

Just as we went running to the teleporter I heard one of the walls crack loudly besides me. Looking up I saw that the wall began crumbling. I quickly pushed Sophia ahead of me while I jumped back just in time to see the wall collapse and block the passage for me to the teleporter.

"Are you alright?" I heard Fayt yell over the rubble.

"Yeah I'm fine how're you two? Are you hurt?"

"No we're fine, but it looks like we'll have to spent some more time here getting you out."

"No you can't do that. If you do that the wall will collapse on top of you guys too. Go ahead. I'll be there in a few minutes. I just have to take the detour." I yelled over the rubble.

"Ok, see you in the shelter" Fayt yelled although I could hear that he was not happy with it.

I quickly rushed over to the other side of the hotel were there were also teleporters. The route there would however cost me an extra 10 minutes even if I went running. Once near the other teleporters I was relieved to see that they were still working.

I stepped in on the teleporters and reached the evacuation facility. There I saw something that I didn't really like to see. Fayt, Sophia and another girl were being cornered by 8 spider like machines. Fayt was holding a metal pipe as if it was a sword, Sophia was standing behind him holding her ankle with blood on her hands and the little girl was busy holding 3 of the machines at a distance.

"Great" I muttered as I quickly looked for something that I could use to help them out. The only things that I could see were a piece of glass that was reflecting and another metal pipe.

Picking up both of them I rushed in on the machines and trusted the pipe in the one standing back the most. It penetrated the machines armor but the pipe was completely ruined after that.

"So much for that weapon." I said looking dumbstruck. "Now I just have this mirror."

The other machines had however also turned around after I had ruined one of there own kind. One of them fired a laser of some sort at me. I could only barely dodge it and see that it easily melted a piece of the wall behind me.

'Crap, if I get hit by that I'm a goner' I thought.

I could see that 2 of the other machines had also started to charge up their laser's. But the same thing that happened in the Battle simulator happened here as well.

I suddenly saw the machine's moving extremely slow. From the corner of my eye I could see it was not just them. Fayt, the little girl and even the two laser's that were now coming at me were going extremely slow.

'That's it' I thought as I thought about the glass piece in my hand. I quickly raised it and reflected 1 of the laser's to its owner and toasted the machine. I did the same with the second laser after a split second reaction (even when everything was in slow motion for me I still had to react at top speed to bounce back both lasers).

Fayt in the meantime had also busted his pipe on one of the machines. He had also managed to destroy it but was now without a weapon. That still left 4 more to be dealt with. Looking over to the little girl I could see that she had already taken care of 2 of the 3 robots on her own.

'guess I won't have to worry about her then.' I thought looking around for the last robot. Suddenly I felt something jump on my back as I was pushed to the floor. I felt the air swirl around my neck as I heard the sound of a drill VERY close to my face.

Thinking that the thing might penetrate my neck I was surprised to suddenly hear a small bang and I felt the machine being thrown of my back. When I looked up I could see one really big guy who had apparently kicked the robot of of me.

"thanks" It was all I could say because I was still a bit shocked. He had just saved my life.

"don't mention it. You also risked your live to save the little missy." He answered.

After I got up I walked over to Sophia, Fayt and 'the little missy'. Fayt was still in a shock of some sort because the big guy that just saved me lifted him over his shoulder to carry him to safety. I ran over to Sophia and check how she was doing while Fayt was still yelling something about his father and mother.

Her ankle wasn't that badly hurt it just bleeded pretty bad but nothing serious. I quickly swung her onto my back andcarried her over to the save area behind the doors where the big guy had also carried Fayt.

I had no idea about what was going to happen but it sure was unexpected.

Chapter 3 the revised version. Hope you like it and once again please revieuw.


	4. this is were you come in

Dislaimer: i don;t own Star Ocean or any of the things. I'm just a poor guy that doesn't own anything.

Let's get on with chapter 4 of:

Lucifer's Tale

Chapter 4: this is were you come in.

I stil can't believe that it happened. Fayt's parents had suddenly disappeared. Sophia told me what happened when we were in the facility but I still had a hard time believing it.

I looked to my left and saw Fayt sitting there looking all depressed.

"I can't blame him. The guy just lost two of the most important people in his live. And if it wasn't for Peppita and Ursus we would have been dead as well."

When we arrived in the escape facility Peppita told me something about having extremely good reflexes. Even better then anyone she has ever seen. And that it meant a lot coming for someone of her race. I figured that after seeing her fight with the robots she too had a very fast reaction to everything.

After we slept for a bit(and I can't remember the last time I needed sleep that much. I was exhausted) we heard that the transport ship Helre had arrived and was waiting for us. Sophia's ankle was healed already. She said something about using symbologie to heal it. I didn't really pay much attention to it because I was too tired.

Aboard the Helre I was vast asleep in no time. I woke up about 6 hours later.

It was just in time to hear a voice over the intercom say that we should go and get to the escape pod because we were under attack by the Vendeeni again. I had started to seriously get annoyed by these guys.

After making my way over to the escape pots with Fayt and Sophia I stepped in the pod on the complete end of the hallway. Fayt and Sophia got in the two pods before mine. The last pod left.

I got shot out of the Helre just before it exploded. The shock of the explosion had caused the pod to loose its balance just before it entered Gravetic Warp. Because of the shock the computer had totally lost the course. I had no idea of where I was going.

"computer, predict landing planet" I said to the machine.

"cannot comply at current time. Ship is damaged by the explosion and cannot estime course for unknown time."

Not the answer I was looking for. Looking at my side I found an instruction booklet for the pod.

"Fine. Computer, wake me up by the time you do know where we're headed." I said as I entered the command for the hyper sleep to prevent myself from getting totally bored during the long hours.

"Planet found" the computer said as I waked up.

"great. Which planet is it?"

"Elicoor II. A planet listed as an Underdeveloped Planet. As such it falls under the Pangalactic Federation's Underdeveloped Planet Preservation Pact. Its current level of development is equal to Earth's 17th century."

"When do we arrive at the planet?" I asked the computer.

"ETA is in 2 hours." The answer came.

"two hours? How long have I been asleep?" "You have been asleep for a total of 170 hours." the computer said.

Great, so now I only have memories of about 4 weeks time and I spent most of it asleep. Just great.

"What's our estimated landing place? Display it on visual image".

At the command the computer created a 3D image with the projector of a city. It was a fairly large city with a huge castle near the northern side of the city. The city had a great deal of water surrounding it and a huge lake just behind the city.

"hold it. Are we going to land in the middle of a city?"

"Correct. Course cannot be altered due to damage to the steering wings."

"is there absolutely no way we can change our course? If we crash into that city headfirst with this speed we'll level it."

This is were I started telling you my story.

"Only one course of action possible."

"show it." I ordered the computer.

"The fuel tanks still have approximately 15 fuel left. If it were to come to an explosion it could alter the course of the pod by an angle of 38°."

"That should be enough to prevent us from crashing into the city right. Where will we land then? Simulate the image." On my command the computer simulated a landing line from the pod were I led the fuel explode halfway through and therefore avoid crashing into the city.

The image of where I landed however was not a pleasant one. According to the simulation I'd land in the middle of the lake.

"Computer what's the change of survival for this course of action?" I asked because this plan involved me being in a ship that would half explode first and then land face first in the water with a speed of a few thousand kilometers a second.

That would really hurt. I felt a strange tingle as there was a spiral of light going over my body.

"Change of survival is 67" the computer said after having researched my body with the scan.

"Alright then" I said. "67 is pretty high for something like that. But how am I supposed to get out of the pod in the water?"

"with the weight of the pod approximately 4.6 tons this ship will sink to the bottom of the lake in 4 minutes. The pressure will be high enough to crush a human body in 35 seconds. The pressure will be to great for the pods door after 15 seconds. Recommended course of action is to jump from the ship before crashing into the water."

'Great. Just great. Not only did I have to do a kamikaze with this pod to prevent it from leveling a city I also had to jump the ship before it hit the water. And that was only getting to the planet. I still had to get to land, get some food and manage to survive.' I thought

"how long will the time frame be between exploding the fuel and crashing into the lake?" I asked the computer

"time between combustion of fuel and crashing into the lake will be 15 seconds. However after the fuel tank is destroyed all automatic functions of this ship will stop. Emergence hedge cannot be opened automatically."

"So now I have to open the hatch manually as well. Any other problems computer?"

"Negative. Although a change of clothes to match this planet's current civilization is recommended"

"Do you have any recommendations for that computer"

"no. this system is not programmed with clothing recommendations."

After thinking it over for a minute I had an idea.

"Computer, do you have access to the Battle Simulator character files?"

"affirmative. This system has a direct connection to the Batle Simulator data base." The reply was just what I wanted to hear.

"good. Then show me an image of the armor of customary character Lucifer Allheart. Placed on my body."

At once the image of the city disappeared and showed my body wearing a real live version of the armor I wore in the Battle Simulator.

"doesn't look to bad. Replace my current clothing with the outfit displayed in this image."

After that I was surrounded by light again only this time I lasted longer. It surrounded my entire body and I felt a sudden chill and then a strange warmth again. When the light was gone I was in a completely different outfit.

I looked at myself quite pleased. I was in a black suit from neck to toes. It was fitting perfectly to my body, almost like a second skin. On my lower arms and legs were pieces of armor as well as on my torso. Although the armor wasn't thick or heavy at all it still looked pretty strong. More then capable of tacking a hit, that much was certain.

I had a katana lying on my lap, there was nothing special about it. It wasn't really heavy or light. It was weighing about 1.5kg and looked easy enough to handle. After unsheathing it I saw that the weapon was just plain sharp. It looked like it could cut through anything in a single strike.

My mouth and nose were both held behind a small mask that prevented me from breathing normally. The mask was also a part of my suit. I had to get used to it I guess. My silvery hair was not hindered or bound at all so it could just fall however it liked. Most of it fell downwards behind my ears but a few locks still fell in front of my eyes although most of it was not long enough to reach my eyes.

After carefully looking I discovered that I had more weapons then I thought. Despite my armor being as light as it is, both of my arm and both of my leg protection pieces had hidden daggers in then.

Each about three quarters or an arm in length. They were placed so that they would be easily pulled out by me yet very hard to see for an opponent. 'I sure made this armor with precision when I still had my memories.' I thought. 'This thing is perfect for battle. I can block any kind of attack, my movements aren't hindered by it and it had good emergency weapons. Seems a little much for a Battle Simulator.'

I pulled down the mask to make it easier to breath for myself. I still had some time left before things turned into total hell. I decided to rehearse the timing for realizing the shaft when I'd crash onto the planet.

An hour later the pod bursted into flames as the fuel exploded and the action began.

Hope you enjoyed it. If you did please revieuw.


	5. the sacred city of Aquios

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Ocean Till the End of Time.

Now let's get on with chapter 5 of:

Lucifer's Tale(still open to new suggestions for the name)

And this one is REALLY big.

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Chapter 5: The Sacred City of Aquios. 

I washed up on the beach of the lake a little while after the pod had crash-landed in the lake. After seeing the whole thing burst into flames al around me and then jumping out of it just before I hit the water wasn't bad enough yet, I was knocked out by the impact with the water and when I woke up on the beach I saw that 4 armored soldiers stood before me.

My weapon was nowhere near me and I was feeling terrible. As I looked up I saw 4 women standing just behind the group of men near a horse of some sorts.

One of the was holding my katana. She head fiery red hair and was wearing some very revealing clothes. She had tight high stockings and short combat boots along with a mini-skirt (which she must have use for either great sex-appeal or free movement, or maybe both) and a top with short sleeves. On her belly she was wearing some leather armor. Behind her she had two holsters strapped that looked like they were holding some daggers or short swords. One of them was longer then the other however.

Next to her was a woman standing with a little longer hair and a somewhat different outfit and silver hair. She was wearing a long skirt and had two holsters of equal length strapped on her back, both were about the length of short swords.

The third woman had blond hair and was again wearing different clothes but no weaponry. She was just wearing gloves that looked like they had some sort of claws attacked to the wrist and spikes on the upper part of the fingers. Her clothes were more silver colored then the first two women and she was wearing a min-skirt as well. She also had a sort of long skirt covering her legs from behind. She was also wearing tight high stockings.

The fourth woman had purple hair, was wearing a mini skirt as well. Her clothes were the same as the blond woman for the most part except that she didn't have a long skirt covering her legs and that she had a staff of some sort on her back.

The purple haired woman was looking at me as I was looking around scanning the area.

"Hey Lady Nel" she said in an incredibly high pitched voice.

"Looks like that guy's woken up." At once all eight people looked at me. I was jerked up by two of the soldiers. From the looks of it all eight of them were soldiers. The four women were probably higher ranked officers due to their clothing and the fact that one of them was addressed as 'Lady'.

"Where am I?" I asked in a confused and tired voice (which was just the way I felt at the time).

"You are on the beach of the lake of Apris. Near the Sacred City of Aquios." The silver haired woman said. Unlike the purple haired girl her voice was rather pleasant.

"who are you and what happened to you? No one in Aquios wields a weapon like this. How did you get here? Where are you from?" the red haired woman spoke in a tone that was much more threatening and demanding then the silver haired woman's voice.

"I don't know. I don't remember anything at al." I said, knowing that I was only half lying. I did know where I came from, at least where I had spent the last couple of weeks, although she wouldn't believe me. Nor would she believe what has happened to me.

Suddenly I felt a fist come into contact with my face very roughly and hard.

"Hey Lady Nel asked you a question. Answer it. Don't give such pathetic answers" one of the soldiers had punched me straight in the face and seemed pretty angry with me.

There was blood slowly dripping from my nose.

"That's enough! Just because you don't like the answer he gives doesn't mean you can do things like that to him. Perhaps he really doesn't know anything." the silver haired woman suddenly snapped at the man.

But he was already aiming a second fist towards me. This time however I was ready for it. I threw my head back just enough to avoid the punch and quickly punched him just under his ribs from the side.

That was enough to make the soldier fall to the ground in pain. From the corner of my eye I suddenly saw that the other three men also charged at me, two of them with swords drawn.

The one closest to me (one of the two who had pulled me from the ground) also tried to punch me in the face, but I jumped to the side and, as he was crossed over from using all his weight in the punch, kicked him in the head with my lower leg.

I heard the noise of metal breaking and the man went flying a bit. Connecting with my armor must have really hurted him. The other two were still left and by the time I turned around I was already staring at a sword coming to my head with full speed.

I quickly ducked to dodge, turned to his side and away from his friend and his sword, and gave him a quick jab in the back of his neck, which was unprotected, like some of the other area's in the armor, to allow movement.

The man dropped to the floor instantly, being temporarily paralyzed from his neck down. I quickly picked up his sword to confront the fourth and final soldier.

He looked like he was scared to death of me and I couldn't blame him. He just saw me beating four people with equal level of skill in a few seconds without even getting hurt. I used the sword from the paralyzed soldier to knock the terrified soldiers's sword out of his hands. After that he was on the receiving end of my arm, my fist being buried deep in his face. He too instantly fell to the floor crying out in pain.

As I looked over to the four women I saw that they hadn't even moved despite the fact that I had just beaten up four of their men.

They had all however pulled out there of weapons. The redhead was holding a pair of daggers of different length. In her left hand she was holding a dagger and with her right hand she was holding a short sword that was a bit longer then the dagger. She was standing crouched a little bit ready to dash at me in an instant.

The silver haired woman had pulled out two short swords and was standing in the same stance as the redhead. She, however, was leading with her other hand and both of them had there short swords in a position were they could easily slash at me.

The blond had gotten into a battle stance, similar to a boxing stance. She had also shifted her weight more and now that her legs were also revealed I could see that her lower legs had pieces of armor similar to mine, but with spikes on them.

The purple haired woman had pulled out her rod and had taken a few steps back, holding her rod out in front of her in a defensive position.

They were all looking at me, my katana lying behind them. I threw my sword over to their feet.

"I have no intention to fight with you people. The only reason I beated them up was because I was kind of reacting to their treatment. Please show me forgiveness." I pleaded to the four women.

I was in no mood for fighting more people.

"I indeed do not remember anything at all."

"I see", the silver haired woman said. "They were out of line for doing this but you DID overreact. But, as you say you appear to show no hostile intensions. And you also looked pretty beat up. Come with us. We'll take you to the Holy City. There you can tell us what you do remember. I am Clair Lasbard. This is Lady Nel Zelpher and her direct subordinates Tynave and Farleen."

She said as she pointed to the redhead, blond and purple haired women.

"We will however tread you as a prisoner and as such we require you to give us all you weapons and armor. You will get them back after our investigation is complete." Nel suddenly spoke.

It was clear that unlike Clair she didn't want to trust me just yet. I pulled out the four hidden daggers and took of my armor, laying it in front of them, near the sword I had already thrown on the ground.

Tynave and Nel suddenly made a low whistle as they saw me pull out the daggers. They had obviously not thought that I would show them weapons hidden that well.

Farleen picked up all of it and placed it in a bag on the horse. After that she and Clair walked over to the four soldiers and raised their palms at them.

Then happened one of the strangest thing's I've ever seen. From their palm a blue light began to glow and suddenly the injuries of the soldiers seemed to heal much faster. Id didn't even take them a minute to recover from all their injuries including the paralysis that should have lasted for a few hours. This must have been that symbology that Sophia was talking about. 'inpressive' I thought, 'that can be pretty useful when fighting a lot of enemy's.'

While Farleen and Clair were busy with the soldiers, Nel and Tynave turned to me.

"So tell me" Nel suddenly said. "Do you remember your name? It would make conversation a whole lot easier knowing just who I'm talking to."

I can't say that I couldn't see that question coming and, not wanting to spent another long time without a name, I said the only name I knew I ever used.

"My name," I said, "Is Lucifer. Lucifer Allheart. Pleasure to meat you Lady Nel."

During the trip to Aquios I learned about their land Aquaria and their neighboring land Airyglyph were at a heavy war. That's what made her soldiers so jumpy earlier.

Although I was a prisoner for the time being I was allowed to walk freely with them. I was not chained or anything of the sorts. The four soldiers were keeping a good amount of distance between me and them.

When we reached the city it was my turn to give a low whistle. This was the city that I was going to crash into if I hadn't destroyed the fuel tanks.

It was, there were no other words for it, beautiful. Although you could feel an air of discomfort because of the war, this town looked en felt simply beautiful. It was like paradise itself.

"So now we're in the Sacred City right? Now what are you going to do with me?" I asked Farleen who was closest to me.

"You'll have to wait for a little while and in the mean time the commanders of the different legions will decide on what to do with you. It could happen that you're imprisoned for a while. But you could also be walking out this very afternoon a free man." She replied cheerfully.

"hold it. The commanders of your legions? But aren't they a little too high ranked to concern themselves over something like this?" I wondered out loud.

"No as you can see Nel and I are doing missions just like normal soldiers and since you are very strong Nel and I will talk about this with the other commander. Tynave and Farleen will keep you company in the city for a while." Clair suddenly said.

"WHAT! YOU AND NEL ARE BOTH COMANDERS OF PARTS OF THE ARMY?" I couldn't help but shout in surprise.

I had not expected the two young woman to be such high ranked officers in the army. Both Nel and Clair walked away towards the castle to speak with the third commander about what to do with me.

"So let's go." Farleen suddenly said in her cheerful voice.

"go were?" I said in surprise.

"let's go start the tour through the city of course. No better way to kill time then to take a long and relaxed walk through Aqiuos." She said as she suddenly walked ahead of Tynave and me.

We both quickly followed her. I wouldn't want to miss a tour of this beautiful city could I?.

Nel and Clair came back a few hours later. They had been talking all that time.

"Well you free to go Lucifer." Clair said. "Neither of the Commanders nor the Queen saw any objection to you staying a free man."

At this I looked rather happy. I was afraid I'd get sentenced to prison for beating up there soldiers.

"However… " She continued, "Her Majesty and Magistrate Lassele would like a show of your skills after hearing that you effortlessly beated four of our soldiers. They would also like to try and pursue you to come and join our army. Of course the choice is all up to you." She took a small pause before continuing.

"It is late and as her majesty's apology for all the inconvience we have arranged that all you weapons will be repaired and your stay at the inn tonight is for free. Her Majesty would like a demonstration of you skills tomorrow in the afternoon. A soldier will be sent to you to, to come pick you up." Clair concluded her report.

"So I'm not being charged with anything at al and to top it of, you Queen has invited me for a show of my skills and possible to join your army. Sweet."

"Yes, very sweet indeed anyway. Tynave Farleen." Nel spoke and turned to her two subordinates. "We have a mission. We must go to Airyglyph and check out the restlessness of the Dragon brigade. If they are preparing for an attack as the Magistrate fears we are to hinder them as much as possible and report back to the Magistrate and her Majesty. We leave at dusk tomorrow night, after Lucifer's skill demonstration has ended."

"What, you're al going to be there? Going to be a bit crowded won't it." I said surprised.

"We may have spoken you free of al charges and we may have decided to trust you Lucifer, but that doesn't mean that we'll undo all our security." Nel's response was ice cold. It could not be more clear that although I had been legally been given trust, Nel still didn't fully trust me.

I got my armor back the same night and as promised it was all polished up and repaired(it had suffered some damage in the crash). I decided to go out and do some training with my katana so I'd have a good feel with the weapon before the demonstration tomorrow.

And I was glad I did. It took me a few hours before I could use the weapon properly. I went to sleep in the very late hours of the night, with the result that by the time I woke up I only had an hour left before my demonstration.

I got dressed en eat some breakfast after that I was just sitting around on the moonlight bridge enjoying the view. When the soldier came to escort me to the queen I noticed that we were not heading for the castle itself but rather for the garden at the back of the castle.

High up on a balcony I saw Nel, Clair, Tynave, Farleen and some other soldiers. Standing in the middle was a woman dressed in a white robes and a tall man in blue robes behind her.

Without being introduced I immediately knew that they must be the Queen and the Magistrate.

The Queen came foreward and when she spoke her voice was soft and warm, like a mother's voice. "We are Queen Aquaria XXVII the ruler of Aquaria and the Holy Mother of the Church of Apris. We have heard from the Crimson Blade's that you have skills that are most impressive. For that reason I have summoned you here today. I would like you to show to Us the skill that you poses to impress us. You may begin." After what she said I took a deep bow and drew my sword.

At first I kept on making moves with force and speed in them forcing myself to do so, but soon after I had started I could feel that slowly I led my body take control of the demonstration.

It was like I went into trance. My body was moving on it's own as I didn't try to take control anymore. My movement kept getting more and more grace in them and eventually I wasn't feeling like I was fighting any more. It was more like I was dancing.

Eventually I was snapped put of the trance when the Queen and the others applauded for me.

"Your movements are very impressive, especially for one you age" the Magistrate suddenly spoke his voice, though not the most friendly of tones, spoke with respect and knowledge.

"Would it be possible to pursue you to join our ranks? Someone with your skill's is of great need in our army's."

"Magistrate you do not need to try and pursue me. I have no other plans at all. I will join your army."

"Very well. We are most grateful for this Sir Lucifer" the Queen suddenly spoke. A look of surprise passed all the people present, with the exception of the Queen herself and Clair.

"Your Majesty I am not of nobility nor am I a high ranked soldier. I do not have the right to bear the title of Sir." I said as I was surprised by the noble title that the Queen had addressed me.

"Yes you are correct, but you are a fighter of extraordinary level and as such you will immediately be made Lady Clair's direct subordinate and second in command." The Queen suddenly said with a steady voice and face.

She was serious. I was shocked beyond all imagination.

"But your Majesty, I have only just joined your army and have not even proven to be a capable leader, or a loyal soldier. I could also be an assassin send out to kill Lady Clair or yourself. You take far too much trust into someone you have only just now met."

I knew I wasn't making any sense but I was still confused why on earth a Queen would appoint a total stranger with extreme fighting abilities such a high position.

"Precisely you could indeed be any of those things. But because you have warned me of them yourself you are not. I could hear the confusion in your voice and see it in your eyes. Also Lady Clair, Lady Nel and their subordinates have been paying close attention too you. They have not seen anything of a spy or assassin in you. They have decided to give you their full trust and so will we. You are to be Lady Clair's second in command. We will hear no further protest on this matter."

"Thank you very much for this honor your Majesty." It was all I could say at the time.

I met with Clair and Nel again a few minutes after I had been appointed the position of Clair's assistant.

"Thanks for putting in a good word for me. But how did you know that I wasn't a spy or anything?" I was still kind of confused.

"Simple. All four of us are spies and while we were walking back we kept and eye out for anything that could prove that you were lying or that you were a spy. A good spy always manages to find another spy when paying close attention. But although you were looking around all the time you were looking like a child that's outside for the first time. Like you really didn't remember anything about this place. So that part of your story was correct. Also when Tynave and Farleen gave you a tour they also payed close attention to you." Clair spoke up, once again in a calm and soothing voice.

"Yet once again you showed that this was your first time and you didn't even try to ask them anything that would be considered as information gathering. In other words we couldn't find anything suspicious about you. And if we can't find it, that means that there's nothing there. So we decided to give you a position worthy of your skills." Clair's answer was something I had not really expected.

I didn't know they were all spies, not that all four of them were continually watching me for anything suspicious. But that was part of their job after all.

"So Lady Clair do you have anything you wish for me to do?" I asked her.

"No I have no particular task for you right now. I think it would be best if you stayed behind for the time being and read some of the books in the library concerning the situation between Aquaria and Airyglyph. I will travel with Nel, Farleen and Tynave to arias. From there on they'll continue on to Airyglyph's capital to find some information about the restlessness of the Dragon Brigade. She will report any suspicious activity to me by bird mail and if need be I will contact you with the same means. When I request your assistance I want you to leave immediately for arias. Understood?' Clair's voice was still as soft as always but I could hear that she was an expert commander.

"Yes Lady Clair. But how long will the journey to arias take?" "If you walk normally without taking any brakes it will still take you at least 6 full days to reach arias. And at least two weeks to reach the city of Airyglyph. That's why I would like you to come to arias ASAP after you receive a summon from me. Understood?"

"Yes Lady Clair. And Lady Nel, as well as Tynave and Farleen. Good luck on your mission.' I said goodbye to the four of them as they left the city gates.

Over the next few days nothing really happened. I spent most of my time in the library reading about the legends of Apris and the war between the two country's. other times I'd spent in the castle gardens training with some of the other soldiers.

Unlike before when I had the demonstration in front of the queen, I was starting to gain full control over my body and fight style. Although I had not improved my speed, strength or technique during my trainings I had gained nearly full control over them. The only thing that I had not managed to control yet was that strange Slow Motion sight which happened during my fights in the Battle Simulator and the Robot's that attacked Fayt, Sophia and Peppita.

Still I could train with ten soldiers at once and emerge from the training unscratched. They started saying that I could well match up against someone by the name of 'The Wicked' although I had no idea who they were talking about. However, before I could find out who this 'Wicked' was, or how that Slow Motion Sight worked I received a message from Clair.

_Lucifer,_

_I just received a message from Nel. She wrote that a strange object has fallen on Airyglyph. It looks like a very advanced strange thing. Like the runoligical weapons only different. She couldn't describe it very good. She said that there were two men inside of the strange machine and they were captured by the Airyglyph army. She's going to attempt to help them escape and get their help in the war. I want you to come over here now. I have a bad feeling about this entire thing. I think that I could use some extra fighting abilities in this situation. Bring along a few soldiers as well. Some of the soldiers stationed here are no longer in a condition to fight._

_Clair._

After reading the letter I quickly called the ten soldiers that I had been training with the past couple of days and that same afternoon, after having reported this to the Queen, we set course for Arias.

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This was a really long chapter wasn't it? tell me if you liked it or not please. I'll try to make the next chapter a little shorter. And of course please revieuw. 


	6. meeting the enemy

dislaimer: i don't own Star Ocean or any of it's charachters. i'm simply borowing them for my story.

chapter 6 already. compared to the previous chapter it's much smaller, but it will have a battle scene in it. hope you enjoy it.

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Chapter 6: meeting the enemy.

As Clair told me the trip took us about 6 days. Along the way we rested at various other small villages and in the great trading city of Peterny, which was in it's own right pretty impressive.

When we finally reached arias it was late in the night. I went to meet Clair immediately. She infirmed me of the situation and gave me my orders.

Tynave and Farleen were captured by the enemy and held at one of their strongholds. The Kirlsa training Facility. Nel had went after them to save them. The two men from the object from Airyglyph went after them this morning.

She wanted me to follow them the next morning to give as much assistance as possible. Nel said that the two men, who were engineers from Greeton, had very high fighting abilities but she still wanted to send me just to be safe.

The next morning I set course for the city of Kirlsa alone. It was good that I went after Nel and the engineers because about halfway through the path to Kirlsa I suddenly saw about 15 men sitting on Lums(the horse like creatures), wearing heavy armor and weapons.

They all seemed to wait for something that was coming from Kirlsa. One of them was looking very different from the others. Not only was his Lum looking a lot bigger and stronger then the others, he was also the only one wielding a lance and having a sword on his waist.

His armor was looking different as well. More expensive then the others. He was also standing in front of the other horsemen. It was obvious that he was the leader of this group.

They were all part of the Storm Brigade and from what I had heard about them their leader was an elderly man, this could not be the famous Lord Woltar, captain of the Storm Brigade.

Maybe it was his lieutenant, or some other high ranged officer.

I sneaked by a little closer and hid behind a rock so I could listen in on what they were saying.

"My lord, why must we wait here? The Aquarien spies and the two strange men are at the Kirlsa Training Facility. It is practically impossible to escape from their. Sir Shelby is at the Training facility along with over half of the Black Brigade." One of the Soldiers asked the well armored knight.

"Because the same thing was thought of escaping from Airyglyph a few days ago. All three Captains were there, the entire Dragon Brigade and the Black Brigade's Royal guard unit, yet still this Crimson Blade and the two strange men managed to escape without difficulty. We will wait here for them just to be sure. If a message comes from Sir Shelby that he has captured the men we will return to Kirlsa." He answered.

'So, they're waiting in ambush for Nel and the two engineers eh.' I thought.

'I guess I'll have to take care of them first. It'll make things easier for Nel and the others.'

With that I draw my katana and waited for the second when all of them had their back turned to me. It wasn't very long because a messenger came from Kirlsa.

"My Lord, a message from the Kirlsa Training facility." He yelled, his voice in panic.

"What is it? Has Sir Shelby captured the two men?" the knight asked.

"No on the contrary my lord. Sir Shelby has been killed by them. He and half of the soldiers in the Facility were wiped out." The man said.

As all the soldiers suddenly made gasps and other signs of fear I saw a great opening. 6 of the 15 soldiers were standing in such a way that I could kill all of them in 1 rush if I swiped along both of my sides. I sheathed my katana and drew two of my daggers. I didn't make a sound as I rushed in and started my attack on the 15 men.

Before they could realize what happened 4 of the six men I had targeted had already fallen to my daggers. The other 2 from the group were dead before they could react.

The other 9 men and the messenger all turned around at me and drew their swords. I looked around. The messenger was wide open but to get to him I'd have to rush past everyone else and thus show an opening to them.

Instead I putted the daggers back in my armor and rushed at the horsemen closest to me. He countered by rushing at me also. His lance was only inches from my face when I suddenly span around on my feet and, as I came next to him, drew my sword. The momentum from my rush and turn along with the drawing of my sword was enough to make my sword cut him and his sword clean in half.

From there I quickly pulled my sword over my shoulder to block a lance coming from behind me. I span around and swung my sword upwards to throw the second horsemen of guard and after that I followed up with a jump kick to hit him in the chest and of of his lum.

While I came down I pointed my sword downward and pierced his chest. After that I turned around to face the other eight still left. I was already halfway through and still wasn't hurt at all. Some of the soldiers started looking at me with fear in their eyes.

"that's good. Maybe I won't have to kill them all. If they run away it'll be good enough. I don't enjoy killing anyone." I thought.

"If you leave now I will not kill you. Those that stay behind will die by my blade." I spoke up as confident as I could(which was quite confident I can assure you) hoping to scare them all away so I wouldn't have to kill everyone there.

The messenger didn't need to be told twice. He turned around and ran to Kirlsa faster then I've ever seen anyone run. Most of the Storm Brigade soldiers looked at each other as if doubting what to do. Their leader however only laughed at my statement.

"You think that you can kill me? The lieutenant of the Storm Brigade? The only one who has ever beaten me on a lum is Lord Woltar. You stand no change against me Aquarian." He spoke with equal confidence.

"that may be true but there are two things that you've forgot. 1. I'm not on a lum am I? and two." Is said as I tightened my grasp on my katana

"You've never fought me before!" after I spoke I immediately rushed at the horsemen standing on my right who had dropped their guard.

He two was slice up in seconds. That was all the push the other's needed. They turned around at fled back to Kirlsa.

"Too bad that your men aren't as confident as you are eh." I taunted him

"No matter." He replied his voice still full of confidence "I'll take care of you myself and them punish those traitors appropriately. Now come. It is time for your death."

After speaking those words he rushed at me lance at the ready. He was much faster then the normal horsemen. I also rushed into him head first with my sword at my right sight. Just before his lance made contact with my chest I sidestepped to the right and swung my sword upward thinking that I'd cut him in his side.

I was wrong. He had quickly pulled out his own sword to protect his open side.

"This guy is on a whole different level from the others. But I guess he's lieutenant for a reason." I thought. I jumped back and came in for another rushing strike.

The lieutenant threw away his lance because I was too close for him to use it anyway. He quickly drew his sword and came rushing at me. We exchanged sword blow after sword blow. I could easily keep up with his strength and speed while still holding back. After we clashed for the 7th time, I saw that there was only one opening in his fighting. The only opening he had, was that his Lum was unprotected.

"Very impressive" he suddenly said. "I didn't know that there was a male among the crimson blade" we kept pushing our swords together trying to knock each other of balance.

"Then you knew correctly." I replied.

"What? Someone like you is a normal soldier? How can that be?"

"When did I say that I was a NORMAL SOLDIER" as I shouted those words out I suddenly swept the front paw of his lum away, causing the beast to fall. And it's rider along with it. He couldn't defend himself during the fall. That was the first good opening I saw in that fight and I didn't let it go to waste.

I immediately swung my sword upwards towards his torso and was rewarded with the disgusting feeling of blood being swept on my body. It was simply disgusting. But this was war. There are no time to be disgusted by the thought of having to kill other people.

Monsters and machines are one thing, but fighting other humans. Beings that look just like me. It was a thought that I didn't find very amusing. I disgusted it.

I turned my back on this site of massacre and returned to Arias, knowing that Lady Nel, Tynave, Farleen and the engineers were save.

After returning to arias that night I reported to Lady Clair about what happened. She looked very surprised when I told her of what Nel and the others have done.

"They defeated Shelby of the Black brigade? And half of the Black Brigade with him? That's incredible. But what happened afterwards? You overheard the messenger telling that to the Storm Brigade, but then what? Did you immediately returned here?" She sounded confused and I could not blame her.

A man she had only known for a week told her a story most unlikely to hear and has returned without a scratch even after being nearby 15 storm brigade soldiers. "No I did not immediately return her Lady Clair" my response was different from the tone of my report. It was obvious to anyone that I didn't like what I was about to tell them, but it had to be told non the less.

"After hearing this information I decided to help them in the best way possible. In other words, I decided to remove the trap of the Storm Brigade. I. I, the lieutenant and most of the others there. About 4 of the other members of the Storm Brigade turned tails and fled from the battle along with the messenger."

The look in Clair's eye's as well as the others in the room was a look of total surprise.

"So then when you came in this afternoon covered in blood…" Clair spoke

"Non of it was my own blood" I answered her question before she asked it.

"I was surprised by this as well. My body proved to be much stronger then I thought it was. I never thought I could take out that many soldiers without problems. Especially not if one of them was a lieutenant of the Brigade." As I finished silence filled the room.

"You must report this at once to Her Majesty and the Magistrate. She must know of this drastic change in power. Airyglyph shall not be pleased with the defeat of two of their lieutenants and so many soldiers. Lucifer, you must return to the royal city at once and report to Her Majesty. You are dismissed" and so I left Arias through the same portal that I came in the previous evening. Heading back towards the royal city.

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wat'd you guys think? please revieuw. 


	7. reunion and special combat ability's

disclaimer: don't own anything at all and there's no money to be made by sueing me.

on with Chapter 7, wich is another big one.

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Chapter 7: reunion and special combat ability's 

I arrived in the Royal City six days later as expected. There were no trouble along the way. I immediately reported to the Queen and the Magistrate. They were surprised to say the least. They had looks on their face just like Clair had when I told her the report. When I finished my report the Queen spoke at last.

"You are to remain in the royal city again for the time being. When Lady Nel returns with the engineers we would like you to help them in as many ways as possible. You will help them to the best of your abilities. Until then you are to remain training as much of the soldiers in the royal city as possible. Do you understand this Sir Lucifer?"

"Yes your Majesty. Then with your permission I would like some room to be made available in the castle's garden. Then I can train a good deal of soldiers at once, although the training method will be far different from that which I previously did. It will train the soldiers for a bit better mastery of their weapons but it won't train them for any real battle experience."

"Very well. We will arrange for a training area in the Gardens." With that I slowly walked away and started making preparations.

The next couple of days were once again days in which I did nothing but train soldiers and read in the library's. After the seventh day however I started to get a bit worried about when Nel would return. It was a six day walk from arias. What could be stalling them so much? I got the answer when they arrived the next day.

As I was training half of the castle's soldiers. They were al holding wooden swords or dull spears and continued to strike at pieces of wood. One of the other soldiers came running over. When he was closer I could see that he was one of the royal guards.

"My lord." he began. "Lady Nel has just returned and is waiting for your in the audience chamber."

"Very well. I'll go see Lady Nel and the Queen at once. You men continue your training!" When I entered the audience chamber I immediately bowed down to the Queen.

"Your Majesty, you have summoned me."

"Yes indeed We have. Sir Lucifer we would like you to meet our two guests from Greeton." As I turned around I got a clear view of the two men and got the shock of my life.

One of them was a large masculine blond who seemed more of a brute then an engineer. He was wearing tight clothes similar to mine, although his were made out of a more leather like material. He also had a few belts around his waist and wore some kind of thin body-fitting torso armor. Almost his entire left arm had been encased in a steel gauntlet, while his right only had a fist incased in steel.

The other was the one who I was shocked about though. He was shorter then me or the blond man, he had blue hair and was looking at me with an equally shocked face. Before me stood no-one other then Fayt Leingod. The very same person who I met on Hyda 4. his clothes had changed quite a bit two. He now had a real sword strapped behind him, like he had in the battle simulator. He was also wearing combat boots with pieces of steel in the noses. Over his wite shirt he was wearing a trench coat.

A few hours later Fayt and I had told each other what happened to us ever since Hydra. Fayt had spent some time on a planet called Veinguard 3 when Cliff, the big blond guy, rescued him.

From there they had once again been chased by the Vendeeni and were forced to land on Elicoor 2. Only they actually DID crash right into a city. From there they escaped from Airyglyph prisons, ran over to kirlsa, Arias, the Kirlsa Training facility and after that they went to Peterny.

From Peterny however there was a delay of 1 day when a they had to go to a forest in order to save a young girl, something like Ammonia or something. They also said something about meeting a kid there, to which Cliff immediately started grumbling something about little brats.

That had been the reason they had been delayed for so long. This was all discussed in a private room with just the three of us. Suddenly Cliff spoke up for the first time.

"Well how are we going to cover this up? They believe that Fayt and I are from this kingdom called Greeton. How are you going to fit into the picture?"

I thought for a minute before answering."Simple. I have amnesia. I told them that and it's the truth. Let's just tell them I'm with you guys. I'm also from Greeton and traveled with you to save your father. I fell from the ship and landed in the lake near Aquios. Because of the smack on the water I lost most of my memory's. When I saw you I remembered where I came from. How's that for a cover up?" I said, looking at Cliff.

"Pretty good idea. Let's do that." He said with carefree voice.

"Anyway, Nel and the engineers are waiting for us." Fayt spoke up again.

With that we left the room and went over to the research lab. Fayt helped the researchers to solve some of their problems in mere minutes. After taking a look at the thunder arrow he finally saw what was wrong. They needed a special metal for it. Copper. And there was only one place where we could get that.

So the next morning the four of us set out to go to the Bequerel Mine. We spent a night in Peterny and continue'd for Arias the next morning. After six days of traveling we met Clair, Tynave and Farleen in Arias. The following morning we went on our way to the mines.

After a few hours of driving on the carriage we arrived at the mines only to see two big dragons flying in front of it. Both of the dragons had an armored soldier riding them. They were members of the Dragon Brigade. After some discussion we decided that there was only one way. We had to take them out, dragons and all.

"There were only two of them so it shouldn't be to much of a problem right." cliff spoke up pretty confident.

"You'd wish cliff. The amount of enemy's is nothing we need to worry about. The thing we SHOULD be worrying about is the fact that the can fly outside of our range for attacking, yet still be able to attack us. If they decide to take this fight up into the sky I can only use my Runologie to hit them. Any other attack will be pretty much useless."

"In that case the perfect scenario would be if we could kill them before they saw us coming. But since the rocks on top of this hill won't give us any cover they'll discover us anyway. The only way is to rush in head first." with that I drew my sword and got ready to rush in. Fayt and Nel did the same, while Cliff cracked his fist, ready to beat the living crap out of the dragons.

It didn't take the dragon rider's very long to notice us. They gave us some strong talk and we went in for the fight. Fayt and I focused on 1 of them and Nel and Cliff took the other. It wasn't all that difficult. Fayt and I both jumped different way from them. The dragon went after Fayt. That was my clue to attack it. I rushed in and was ready to stab the dragon through the back when I suddenly noticed the Dragon rider's Lance coming at me. I jumped to the side to dodge.

'Damn. I forgot that they can think and attack independent of each other. Well let's finish this anyway'. I thought cursing inwardly for making such a mistake.

Still standing behind the dragon and out of the range of the Lance I stabbed the dragon in the side. The dragon used its wings to slap me back a few meter's colliding with Nel. Fayt had used the opening the dragon created after my stab to cut of its head in on swift blow. As the Dragon crashed to the ground and collapsed dead, Fayt jumped up and slammed his sword through the knight in another powerful swing.

The first dragon knight head been killed. As I turned my attention to the second I noticed that Cliff was busy running from the dragon's flames and I was still lying on top of Nel, who apparently wanted to finish of the dragon when I crashed into her.

Seeing how his partner was defeated the second dragon knight suddenly went a few feet up in the air, going out of Cliff's, Fayt's and my range.

"Grrrrrr... You won't get away with this!" he yelled before running like a coward.

Before we could react he was already flying over the mountains making it impossible for us to attack him.

"Oh no. he'll come back for sure, with reinforcements. We're in deep trouble." Nel was looking and sounding very worried.

"Well in that case let's not waste any time here. Let's hurry up and get that copper." Cliff too sounded a bit worried. i had a little idea all of a sudden.

"You guys go on in. I'll stay back here and make sure you won't get ambushed. I'll nail any reinforcement that they sent here before they can enter the mines."

"why would you stay behind? We'll need all the power we have if we want to take out all the dragons in there." Nel had a look of surprise on her face.

"Because you guys are more then capable of taking out those dragons on you own. However if you get a whole army of soldiers on your tail you'll be in deep trouble." I then turned to Fayt.

"If any enemy's come I'll contact you with 'it'." I said while tapping my pocket in which I still had my communicator. Fayt understood and they went into the mines followed by Tynave, Farleen and the other people that had come with us.

I ran up the hill and found some rocks that would give me a good cover from attacks from behind and most importantly from above, while I still hade a good view of the entire area. After a couple of hours it looked like my worries were unneeded, because there was still no-one coming. Right after I said that to myself I heard the flapping of wings in the distance.

'Damn. I know I shouldn't say things like that. It brings bad luck' I thought as I looked up from my cover to see how many enemy's had come. A dozen or so of normal foot soldiers and three of those dragon knights. One of them however looked different from the others. His dragon was bigger and his armor was also different from the other two.

'Looks like another high level officer, he' I thought to myself. I pulled out the compact communicator that I still had in my pocket. I quickly send Fayt a text message about the situation outside. Within a few seconds I received a response from Fayt saying that I should stay down for a few more minutes. They were almost done in the mines and would create a distraction so I could attack them from behind (he also wrote that it was Nel's idea to do that).

And as they said a few minutes later Nel, Cliff and Fayt came running out of the cavern to engage the enemy in what seemed like pure frontal assault. While they were dealing with the foot soldiers, I sneaked around on top of the mountain trying my best to stay invisible. And that wasn't easy with the limited cover that these hills were offering. While I was sneaking around the high-level officer of the dragon Brigade began bragging while Tynave and Farleen raced out with the copper loaded wagon.

Fayt and the Others had just dealed with the soldiers when I jumped out of hiding and immediately slashed one of the dragon knights with my katana, slicing him in half and causing such a huge gape in the dragon he was riding that the beast was dead before hitting the ground.

I looked up and saw that Fayt, Cliff and Nel had already stormed the other dragon knight and were having a little more trouble with him than I had.

"I guess that means I get to kill you" I said as I looked at the man on the big dragon.

"HAHA! Fool you think you can defeat ME? Do you even know who I am? I am Demetrio, the lieutenant of the storm brigade!" he shouted back at me.

"Point being? You're the only lieutenant that your county has left. The other 2 have already been defeated by us." I said in a tone that betrayed no emotion whatsoever.

"No, that can't be. We heard reports that a small group of aquarians had killed that idiot of a Shelby but there was no group involved when Herman was killed. It was only one man according to the cowards that fled from the battle."

"Herman? That's the name of that idiot in shining armor? The one who claimed that he was the lieutenant of the storm brigade? I defeated him and all of his man. They didn't even pose a threat. And….. NEITHER WILL YOU!" I suddenly shouted the last part as I charged at him with my sword right by my side ready to strike him fast and hard.

I saw the dragon inhale in an attempt to roast me with its flame breath. I quickly ran past its mouth and got out at it's back getting a clear shot at it's back. Before I could stab it however Demetrio had his lance in between my sword and the dragon. I quickly rolled around the lance and kicked Demtrio in the face, knocking him of his dragon. Once Demetrio was on the Ground I jump up to take his seat on the dragon and bring my sword done through the Beast's Neck. It dropped dead to the ground instantly.

Suddenly I felt immense pain in my lower back. I heard Fayt yell for me before rushing past me, sword in a stabbing position. A few seconds later I heard the clashing of swords behind me. Obviously Demetrio must have gotten back on his feet and attacked me in the back.

I turned around and saw Demetrio's lance lying behind me, the tip soaked in blood. My blood. I looked around and saw that Nel and Cliff had already killed the other dragon knights. Meanwhile the fight between Fayt and Demetrio kept going on with Fayt obviously having the upper hand, yet Demetrio's defense with a sword was good enough to prevent Fayt from giving any hits.

As both of them jumped back for some breath Fayt did something that I'd never seen before. "Scorching Flames, grant me your power!" he said while putting his left hand near the base of the sword. Almost instantly the Blade ignited with flamed.

Fayt charged at Demetrio again and once again Demetrio managed to barely block Fayt's strike. This time however, something different happened. Demetrio's sword suddenly looked like it had melted quite a bit at the place were Fayt had hit it. The sword was damaged to well over halve of its blade.

Fayt charged again but this time came with a strike that went from top to bottom. Demetrio tried to block it again but as a result his sword was broken completely and he was sent flying by the force in Fayt's attack. Before Demetrio could land on the ground however, Fayt had stabbed his sword through his stomach, effectively burning have of his Torso armour and leaving a big hole is Demetrio's Belly. And so the last lieutenant of Airyglyph had fallen to our swords.

We headed back into the mines for a bit so we could be healed by the rumologists that had come with us. Cliff had almost been bitten by one of the dragons and as a result now has some gashes in his left arm, Nel had managed to get away fairly unharmed because she was providing Fayt and Cliff support with Runology. Fayt had been sliced in his left arm from behind a bit. My injury was by far the most dangerous of them all and even then it would have taken a number of weeks before it would have become fatal.

When the runologist were healing me, Fayt and Cliff I suddenly spoke up to Fayt.

"He Fayt, what was that what you did out there? Making your sword turn into flames and all that. And how come it burned through Demetrio's weaponry so easily while not damaging yours?"

"Haha, take it easy, one question at a time please. What I did there was enchanting my sword with Symbology. For some reason I have absolutely no problem with doing that without any previous training. Nel said that even in Aqueria she'd never seen anyone capable of doing that though. But I won't be complaining anytime soon because it saved me more then once."

"Simply said I enchant my sword with an elemental power each of wich has there own advantage. Fire element becomes extremely hot making it possible for me to burn through steel like I just showed. Ice element makes my blade stronger, longer and wider. Also it is such a low temperature that it cools of anything that isn't a part of me. If I use that I can make a fire go out with only holding my sword close to it. Or I can make steel so cold that you can easily break it with a single strike." After that he took a deep breath before continuing.

"Lighting elemental gives of electric shocks that'll go through an opponent who's blocking for example. I strike. You guard, you get shocked pretty painful. You get the idea. The only downside is that if I do it too much I'll get a massive headache afterwards. Also the enchantments will not last forever. Right now I can keep up each element for about 3 minutes before it disappears."

I let out a low whistle that showed how impressed I was. After wards we talked some more with Cliff also joining in. It seemed that Cliff, being a Klausian, was capable of controlling his physical energy, his stamina, into causing a small explosion when he swung his fist down. He could also use it to give a increase in damage for an instant.

It also seemed that Nel, like I always thought, was capable of using her runology to aid her in close combat as well. She can sent a shockwave across the ground, sent a quick burst of ice, create a small poisonous cloud and more things that prove useful in battle.

Overall it took us about 10 minutes to get healed. Afterwards we went after Tynave and Farleen to Arias. Normally the walk from the mines to Arias would take at least 6 hours, but we ware still working with an adrenaline kick from the fight, and wanted to reach Arias as quickly as possible, so we ran all the way and covert the distance that'd normally take about well over 3 hours in about 1 hour and 20 minutes.

At that point we heard something coming from behind the rocks that made the corner we were about to take.

"If any of you hurt those maggots any further you'll end up on my blade, UNDERSTOOD! They are not to be harmed any further" said a rough voice that caused all the others to instantly be silent.

I looked around at Fayt and the others to see that they all shared a knowing look with each other. I was about to ask what was wrong when Nel suddenly spoke up.

"It seems we'll have to go trough them to reach Arias and from the sound of it he has possible captured someone from Aqueria. We have no choice but to face him here and now" after Fayt and Cliff gave a confident nod, and I gave a confused look, we stepped out from behind the corner to meet with our next opponent.

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what'd you think? i even made a cliffhanger of sorts. please revieuw. hope you enjoyed it. 


	8. VS the Wicked one

Another chapter. Time for the long awaited fight with Albel(for me anyway). I got a second review. I'm so happy people like my character and story. I hope this chapter is a bit easier to read.

Disclaimer: don't own Star Ocean. If I did Albel would have a much bigger role in the game.

Chapter 8: VS The Wicked One

Around the corner was a sight I'd never expected. The wagon Farleen and Tynave had used to escape from the fighting back at the mine was being held down by about 5 soldiers in heavy, black armor. There were 10 more standing around Tynave and Farleen who were lying on the ground, bruised a bit but otherwise ok. Standing between the knights was a man that would stand out in any crowd.

His hair was black but at the tips it turned blond. He had bangles of hair in front of his face that could keep his eyes hidden if he were to shift his head a little bit upwards or downwards. Behind him he had two long pieces of hair in chains that reached down to his knees. He was wearing a purple tank top and skirt that'd enable him to move in all directions without any interference. He was wearing combat boots as well to prevent the soil from stopping his movements. At his left side was a weapon similar to mine. He too used a katana and around his neck was a thick collar that looked like he just came out of a torture chamber. The most noticeable thing about him however, was the fact that his left arm was completely incased in metal and where the fingers should be there was only a metal hand with shard talons that looked like fingers. Upon seeing us he immediately putted on a big smirk.

Nel looked at Tynave and Farleen on the ground and got angry. "Albel Nox how dear you do this to my people?" she almost yelled at him. "these weaklings? They tried to stop us when we wanted to get the goods. They…. Dropped like flies" he calmly answered., although with the last part his amusement was obvious. He then suddenly addressed all of us and spoke again, although this time he was sounding a bit more serious. "so now you have defeated all the lieutenants of Airyglyph. I have seen you fight against Shelby and Demetrio and I must admit I'm rather amused. I take it that you are the one that defeated that idiot from the Storm Brigade."

During the last part he pointed to me. "Why do you think that?" was all I could think of to say to him. "Well the Maggot's that fled had given a detailed description about the person they had fought and you match it quite well. Male, Silver hair that reaches the shoulders and a few strands in front of his face. Eyes as red as blood, Black suit that is more like a second skin, with some strange armor on his torso, lower arms and lower legs. Wields a katana when fighting. You match the description perfectly."

While giving the description his smirk grew bigger and bigger. "Maybe you can actually give me a bit of a challenge. Just make sure that you don't leave your back open like you did against Demetrio."

"Say Fayt, is it just me or is this guy rather full of himself?" I whispered to Fayt, who was standing right next to me. "He is pretty arrogant yes, but he is the best swordsman in Airyglyph. His name is Albel Nox and he had some other name I don't remember." Fayt's answer was on a normal volume to have everyone hear that none of us were afraid of Albel. "He is better know as Albel the Wicked." Nel was the one who gave the answer this time.

"So this guy isThe Wicked One?" I suddenly exclaimed.

"What? Don't tell me that now that you know who I am that you're going to back of in fear already?" Albel spoke up, mockery obvious in his voice.

"No, it's just that when I was training some of the Soldiers back in Aqious, some of them said I might be able to match even 'The Wicked One'. That would refer to you wouldn't it? I think it's time to test if they were right or not. What do you say Albel?" I exclaimed with confidence. Then I turned to Fayt and the Others.

"You guys take care of the Soldiers and make sure Tynave and Farleen are save. I'll keep Albel busy for now."

"Right we'll come help you as soon as we are done" Cliff answered.

"Alright if any of you maggots interfere in my fight with the silver haired Worm, or you touch those to Maggots back there" Albel suddenly addressed his soldiers. "You'll end up on dieing by my hand understood." "Yes Sir" they all said with a bit of fear in there voices. With that Albel and his soldiers charged us while we did the same to them.

Fayt, Nel and the Soldiers had already unsheathed there blades. Albel and I rushed at each other swords sheathed until we were only ten paces from each other. At that point we both unsheathed and attacked at the same time.

Our swords clashed and sparks were flying. From the corner of my eye I could see that Fayt had once again enchanted his sword, this time with the power of Ice.

Nel sent out a wave of energy from her blades that decapitated 3 soldiers at once.

Cliff caused a small explosion by slamming his fist to the ground, while jumping, sending 5 more down on the ground waiting for a finishing blow.

In the meantime Albel was grinning like mad. We stood there trying to overpower one another for a few seconds, and then we both jumped back without warning only to rush at each other again. We quickly exchanged some more attacks all the while canceling each other out by hitting the swords.

We jumped back again and rushed at each other again. Albel was grinning from ear to ear looking like he was having the time of his live. When our swords clashed again I shifted my weight forward to increase the amount of pressure I gave. He was having more problems holding me back now. I released all the pressure at once and stepped to the side. Albel lost his balance for a second because of the sudden pressure release. That second was all I needed to land a punch in his face.

He stepped back from the pain. I attacked again with my sword but again he blocked. Albel was looking even wilder then before. He was still grinning like mad, but now there was a fire burning in his eyes. He slashed again

I parried and countered

He dodged and kicked

I raised my left arm to block and thrust my sword forward.

He stepped to the side and slashed.

We kept that up for a long time. From the sideline it looked like we weren't fighting but instead dancing to a silent rhythm. Dancing a dance that would kill whoever stepped wrong first. We both attacked with out swords in the right hand, slashing from the side. both of us raised our left arm to block.

The sound of metal touching metal was heard and sparks were flying once again. My sword was pushing against the outside of Albel's claw , effectively blocking my sword.

His sword was against my armguard, blocking his sword with my lower arm. We had once again reached a stalemate, for the tenth time in 5 minutes of constant fighting. Both of us had no injuries physically, except for the punch I gave Albel in the face.

"Mwhahahaha" Albel suddenly laughed throwing his head back. I looked at him in surprise.

"Finally a Maggot that can actually amuse me. I'll give you credit for being able to hit me and lasting this long. So I'll give you a special reward" he stated.

He let out another evil laugh. I used this time to see how Fayt and the others were doing. They had reduced the soldiers down to 4 and they were still having the upper hand. Nel was standing over Tynave and Farleen using a Runology spell to heal them, while Fayt and Cliff were standing between them and the soldiers. All three of them had some minor scratches and looked like they had seen better days.

Suddenly Albel spoke again "I'll show you why I am the stongest fighter that Airyglyph has. I'll give you the pleasure of seeing my full ability's. Don't die to quickly now. You've got me this far and I hope you'll survive for a bit." He once again started grinning as he raised his sword back and up.

He suddenly slashed his sword forward, by going right past the ground below him. "Air Slash!" Albel yelled and from were the tip of his sword has just barely stayed above the ground, there was some sort of disturbance. The dirt on the ground was sending flying in all sideway directions. That in itself was not so strange. It happened more often when a sword was flying past the ground at high speed.

The strange part was that the disturbance went from the sword across the ground, towards me and fast. I jumped to the side only barely before it hit me. There was a strange sound behind me. I looked around and was, simply said, surprised with what I saw.

Behind me were a few rocks, but across the rocks, at the place that I stood a second ago, there was a large 6 inch deep and 1 inch thick cut into the hard stone surface.

"What was THAT?" I exclaimed with surprise clearly evident in my voice.

"That, Maggot, was one of my special attacks. I focus some of my power into my sword and then send it out in a crescent slash. I allows me to attack from a distance and cut through a man without trouble. It's called Air Slash" Albel answered.

"So the stories are true after all" Nel spoke up, softly.

"What stories?" Cliff exclaimed

"There are rumors that Albel Nox has once killed ten soldiers in one attack. I always thought that it was impossible without some kind of runological support but it seems that he found a way" she answered with little emotion betrayed in her voice, but her eyes showed that she was shocked.

"Of course Fool" Albel spoke up to Nel. "You Aquerian Scum have that blasted Runology of yours, allowing you to fight from a distance. I had to come up with an answer to that and so I perfected my grandfather's fight style."

"He had long ago, when our two kingdoms were still at peace discovered that there were different kinds of energy in the body. You Aquerians use that which he called the 'Energy of the Mind' for your Runology. If you use it too much you'll start getting mental exhaustion. Resulting in headache and in worst case scenario's even passing out." Albel explained with his sword swung over his shoulder, his claw resting on his sheath. He was clearly in a relaxed position, now that we were listening in stead of fighting.

"So he asked himself a question. If the mind has energy that can be used for Runology, is there energy in the body that can be used for physical attacks. He began an extensive research and after 20 years of studying he finally discovered the so called 'Energy of the Body'. He had managed to focus some of his energy into his hand and send it outward. The result was a powerful explosion that had totally destroyed the dummy he used for training and has left a large burn mark."

Albel took a pause for the information to sink in. "However there was a disadvantage. My grandfather was completely exhausted and needed to keep bed for over a week, due to physical exhaustion."

After taking a breath he continued. "After he had first managed to send his energy outward it took my grandfather over 6 months to reproduce the effect. Afterwards he had managed to keep a certain level of control. It took him 4 more years of extensive training before my grandfather had managed to completely control the attack."

"He could use the attack over 20 times a day before passing out from exhaustion. When he had perfected it, my grandfather taught the control of energy to my father. Because my grandfather had discovered how to control his energy he managed to teach my father in 4 years to completely control it and not get exhausted after a few bursts. My father later started to work on a new attack after my grandfather had passed away." While saying this Albel slowly started walking towards me.

"The attack that he worked on was this Air Slash. But my father died before he could complete it. He had already taught me the basics of controlling the energy and how to perform the attack my grandfather had designed. After a bit or experimenting however, I managed to perfect my fathers attack as well." He was still walking towards me.

From the courner of my eye I could see that Tynave was standing again although still weak. She was being supported by Fayt. Behind them Nel was still healing Tynave, while Cliff was keeping a close eye on us, although he looked surprised by Albel's knowledge of energy.

I spoke up again, "you said your father had designed the Air Slash attack. What was the attack your grandfather had created called? I'd be kind of respect less of you to not even mention its name." I taunted him, wanting to work on his sense of honor, trying to buy more time and see if I could trick him into telling me a weakness.

"Fool, I haven't told you, YET. I'm about to tell you it's name."

Albel now stood about 4 feet away from me. He was outside of the reach of my sword and to close to safely use his Air Slash.

'From what I've seen in order to use it he has to swing his sword back and then swing it forward fast, in order to use that attack. If he uses it here he'll just give me an opening.' I thought.

Then it suddenly hit me what he had said about his Grandfather's attack. I looked at his claw and saw it was pulled back and glowing green. He quickly pushed his claw at me at the same time yelling, "Palm of Destruction!"

"Oh SHIT!" was al I could exclaim before I felt a massive impact in my chest, and intense pain was souring through my body.

"AAARGH!" I yelled in pain.

"LUCIFER!" Fayt suddenly yelled out loud.

I made a cliffhanger (sort of). I hope you've enjoyed this chapter. Please Review. I need feedback people.


	9. VS the Wicked One part 2

disclaimer: i don't own star Ocean, it's charachters or storyline. the only thing i own, is my own computer, PS2, TV the original chars in this story and the twists I give the original storyline.

here's Chapter 9. the second half of the fight against Albel. hope you all enjoy it.

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Chapter 9: VS The Wicked One part 2 

"AAARGH!" I yelled in pain.

"LUCIFER!" Fayt suddenly yelled out loud.

I landed on the ground, feeling pain in my torso. Looking down I saw that my torso armor had been almost completely destroyed from the front.

"That was just repayment for hitting me in the face. This was just to show you what this attack is capable of. And for your information, I was still holding it back so I could enjoy my fight with you some more." Now it was Albel who was taunting me.

'Damn, that hurted like hell. If it wasn't for my armor I would be toast from that attack. And he's saying that he was still holding back. Not good at all.' My thoughts were racing. 'I've been hurt too much by that attack, I won't be able to fight at the same speed I was just now. But if I stay at a distance, I'll just be giving him an advantage. I need to come up with some sort of plan.'

I jumped back, trying to get some distance between Albel and myself. Albel did the same. Now there was over 20 feet of distance between us. 'I need to think about what I know about Albel's attacks for a bit. But…'

"Air Slash!" Albel yelled, interrupting my thoughts

'He won't let me take time to think it through.' I thought while jumping to the side.

'Wait a second, he slashes straight forwards when doing Air Slash. He can't control it once he released the attack, meaning he can't make it chance directions. I can just keep running around to the sides, making him miss Air Slash, that should give me some time to analyze his attacks and think of a counter attack.'

"Air Slash!" Albel shouted again.

I quickly jumped to the side, evading the attack.

"Don't tell me you're starting to run away already? Air Slash"

This time I started running to the side as soon as Albel started yelling the attack's name. I was purposefully running in a predictable pattern, to see if Albel could chance the attacks direction thus proving my theory.

'I've seen him use Air Slash 4 times now. From what I've seen he can't chance the direction after he launched the attack. He has to create an opening when launching the attack, but because of the distance between us I won't be able to use it or I'll run straight into his Air Slash. Also he doesn't look tired one bit, meaning that he could keep this up for a while. And finally the attack is pretty difficult to see coming. The only indicator is the disturbance of the ground, but if I keep an eye on that I have to take my eyes of Albel.'

"Trying to come up with a plan are we?" Albel spoke up again, his sword was once again resting on his shoulder. "let me tell you that I won't become exhausted from just a few Air Slashes. You won't win this fight be exhausting me. Besides, although it is fun to see you scurrying around like a rat, I prefer fighting for real. Don't disappoint me now." With that Albel charged me again.

Again our swords clashed, but the results of my injury were clear. I couldn't push Albel back any more and he was now having the upper hand in strength and speed. He was pushing me back more and more. I was having trouble just defending myself.

Albel slashed at me again. I quickly parried and used the chance to run past Albel to get some breathing space. Far enough to be out of his sword's reach, but close enough to use the opening if he would use Air Slash. that meant he would do either a charge again, or use his Palm of Destruction again. I was hoping for the latter.

"What's this, you've suddenly become nothing more then a chicken? You're doing nothing but running." Albel stated with a mocking tone.

"Well, run from this. Palm of Destruction!" and again Albel's claw began glowing and he pushed it forward. I jumped back and saw the attack still coming at me. However I landed on a rock and lost my footing. I slipped and the rock I slipped on was sent upwards, right into Albel's attack.

The attack immediately exploded upon contact. Harming no-one. Albel was just looking more amused then before.

'Wait a second…' I thought. 'I see, this could be useful.'

With renewed motivation I stood up and looked at Albel.

"Are you done playing?" I asked, while using one hand to put my mask, which was still lowered and acting as a thick turtle neck cover, back on around my mouth and nose. After having put it back on correctly and making sure my hair was not trapped inside the mask anymore.

"Because I'm done running!" with that I rushed head first at Albel.

"Air Slash" he yelled and once again swung his sword forward.

I jumped to the side a little bit, just barely enough to dodge the narrow attack and continued rushing.

I thrusted my sword forward trying to stab Albel in the chest.

He sidestepped to the dull side of the blade, pushing his claw forward to cut my gut.

I turned my sword around in my hand, the blade now standing near Albel's neck, and spun around on my right foot. Albel was forced to use his sword to block my attack, while I dodged his claw.

Using my momentum from the rush and the spin, I kept turning, pushing back his sword. My sword broke contact with his, while he was still trying to keep up pressure against me. He lost his balance for a moment, due to the sudden pressure release.

That moment was all I needed for now. My left leg, came around and kicked him in the head, hard. Again there was a nasty sound as my leg guard connected with his forehead.

Albel was sent flying a few feet from the impact.

I quickly drew the dagger from my left arm guard and kept in in my hand in such a way that it was hidden behind my arm.

Albel stood back on his feet and for the first time since we started the fight, he was not grinning like mad. There was a small wound on his head, where my leg had connected and blood was flowing from it. Again I could see a strange fire in his eyes, but now it held something other then amusement. Now I could see anger and seriousness in his eyes as well.

I had my sword raised in a neutral position, that allowed me to defend easily. We were once again standing outside of sword range but close enough to attack In one or two steps.

"Very well. You indeed are an opponent who I can go all out against. For lasting this long and actually making me bleed, I'll fight with everything I have."

With that his claw started glowing again, only his time the glow came much faster and brighter indicating the difference in power.

I waited for a second, until Albel drew back his claw to launch the attack.

Then I jumped back as well, while throwing my dagger towards his claw. An instant before it hit his claw, Albel's Palm of Destruction attack came out and made contact with the dagger.

There was a loud explosion, far more powerful then the first few Palm of Destructions. And the explosion was right next to Albel.

When the smoke was cleared Albel lay on the ground, still alive although hurted badly. He was blown away several feet from the explosion

His claw was completely ruined and hung limply by his side. his left leg also looked pretty damaged and was bleeding as well. His shirt was blown to pieces as well, revealing that his body was, besides being covert in minor scars, hurted badly.

There was blood coming from the side of his head, his shoulder, mouth and various places on his leg. His nose was bleeding as well.

He stood up again, despite his injuries. His sword still in his right hand, he rushed at me again. This time however, he was slowed significantly because of his leg and all the other damage he did.

He jumped up trying to get gravity to help him in his attack's power.

I looked up and got my sword ready for another strike.

He came down crashing fast, his sword above his head ready for a downward slash to cut me in two.

I crouched and at the last moment completely stretched, slashing my sword along the way.

The sound of metal clashing against metal and two warriors screaming while attacking could be heard all over the fields.

We stood there for a moment. I was standing completely stretched, my sword pointing towards the sky.

Albel was standing in front of me, he was hunched down a little. His sword was pointing to the ground.

It was almost as if time stopped for a second. And then it continued again.

Suddenly from the center of the blade small cracks started to spread all over my sword, as a wound from my right shoulder to my stomach opened.

Looking down I saw that Albel's sword was broken in two from the center. In his right hand he was still holding the handle of his katana and half of the blade that was still attached to it. The upper half of his sword was lying on the ground. Then a wound opened up on Albel's body as well, like what happened to me. Only his wound ran from his left leg up to his right shoulder.

As blood started pouring out of our wounds we both crashed to the ground, no longer capable of standing.

"How… How could I be defeated? I'm the strongest warrior on this continent. I'm invincible. I can't believe it, I WON'T BELIEVE IT!" he yelled to the sky, while coughing up blood.

"The only reason you were defeated" I started "was because you showed me your attacks that often. When you fired that Palm of Destruction, the one that hid a rock, I realized something."

I coughed up some blood as well.

"Your attack, it explodes upon contact with something. All I had to do was make sure that the next Palm of Destruction would explode near you. Then I could turn the tables on you. And you made the next Palm of Destruction far more powerful then any before." I explained.

"I caused some mass to be right next to your claw when you fired your attack. The explosion destroyed my dagger, but damaged you enough to allow me to get to this point."

At that time, Fayt, Cliff and Nel came rushing in. Tynave and Farleen were just behind them, both of them walking slowly because they had not yet been fully healed.

"Hang on, I'll heal you" Nel spoke up as she crouched next to me.

"Wait… Heal Albel first." my voice was becoming weaker and weaker.

"What are you talking about? He's the enemy! You defeated him" Nel spoke up while giving me a strange look.

"I know, but we still owe him one."

Everyone looked at me as if I had suddenly grown a new head.

"If it wasn't for him, Tynave and Farleen wouldn't be standing here that well right now"

"If it wasn't for him, we would already be back in Arias" Tynave spoke up with anger in her voice.

"That's not what I meant. After you were captured it took us a good fifteen minutes to get here. In that time you two could have been hurt a lot more, but Albel ordered his men not to touch you. Twice. I think that we should at least thank him for that, don't you agree?"

At this everyone started to look a bit thoughtful. Suddenly Fayt walked towards me and Nel.

"Nel, your better at healing then I am. I know some of the basics that you taught me, but it should be enough to make sure Lucifer survives for now. Can you take care of Albel, at least until his live is in no further danger?"

Nel gave a short nod and walked over to Albel, crouching down and starting to heal him. The Glyphian looked up with a look of pure venom.

"Get away from me Wench. I don't need the help of Aquarian scum like you." He growled.

"Stay still or I'll knock you out Nox. The only reason I'm doing this is because Lucifer has a point." Nel spoke without any sort of fear or compassion in her voice.

"Cliff can you get Lucifer in the Wagon? We need to get to Arias ASAP" Fayt was talking again, this time directed at Cliff.

"No problem" I heard Cliff's response just before everything went black and I passed out from blood loss.

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what'd you think? please give me some comment and feedback in a review. Till next Time. 

preview for chapter 10 of Lucifer's Tale:

Lucifer has te recover from his fight with Albel, a new addition to the team appears and it's of to war.


	10. a new ally and preparing for war

Disclaimer: I don't own SO:TtEoT. It belongs to Tri-Ace.

I'm glad that people like the story so far. But after having taken a look at the hit counter I was shocked. 630+ hits and I only got 6 reviews. Come on people, I need more feedback(although the comments made by IronCross and ThrogmortonMimic were very helpful in clearing a bit of my writing). Even if you simply like the story tell me so. I allow Anonymous reviews so please review. Now enough of my whining and on with the story.  
And this is a BIG update. Hope you enjoy it.

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Chapter 10: a new ally and preparing for war 

"I feel like total crap."

Those were the first words that I spoke after passing out from my fight with Albel. I had just come too and when I looked around I saw that I was in a room. A room that I remembered from when I was walking in the Castle. I was back in Aquios.

"How'd I get back here? You don't go knock out for over a week from blood loss, do you?" the question was not directed at anyone, other then the ceiling. I was most surprised when someone spoke up next to me.

"Yeah, normally you don't, but Nel gave you some sort of medicine to keep you sleeping a while longer, until we reached the castle."

I looked at the door opening and saw Cliff standing there, leaning at the doorpost lazily.

"And it worked just long enough too. We only just made it here, about half an hour ago."

"Where are Fayt, Nel, Tynave and Farleen?"

"They're all fine. Tynave and Farleen stayed behind in Arias. They'd only need a little rest to recover further and then they'll help the town defense. Nel is reporting to the Queen that Airyglyph knows about the Thunder Arrow, Demetrio told us so just before you jumped out. And Fayt's with Mirage right now"

"Who's Mirage and why is Fayt with here?" the question didn't seem to stop popping up today.

"Mirage is my partner in crime and another Klausian. We separated after we landed in Airyglyph. She followed us here to Aquios and when she got here, only a few minutes before we did, she saw a girl collapse to the ground. A girl that Fayt met a few days before, back in Peterny. Her name's Ameena. She said she was here to come find an old friend of hers."

"Ok." It was all I could think of saying.

Looking around I noticed something strange. My sword was set against the wall, the sheath laying next to it. However there was not a scratch on it. Looking around some more, I also saw that my armor was gone.

"He Cliff" is started

"Yeah, what's up? More questions?"

"How come my sword's all fixed up.And where did my armor go?"

"Well, the first time Nel, Fayt and I were in Peterny, we split up for a bit. Fayt found this group called the Inventors Guild. With the Inventors Guild, you can hire inventors for various tasks, such as blacksmithing for your weaponry, cooking for your party's and more stuff. We hired a few blacksmiths to get your gear fixed up." He explained

"Thing is, the duplicator you used back in the escape pod has no problem making materials. It just alters the atoms that you clothes are made of. So all of your armor was made of a very light and durable metal called Mythril. But that stuff is very rare and expansive here on Elicoor. Fixing your sword was no big problem because they still had a small supply lying around."

"They need a new shipment of Myhtril for your armor and replacing your dagger. But we placed the priority on the armor. Welch, the Guild's receptionist told us I'd take about a week to fix, because a new shipment of ore was on its way to Peterny already"

"And how long ago was that? 2 days or something?" I asked Cliff.

"No it was 3 days ago. Fayt immediately went to get it fixed and we left the day afterwards, when they'd fixed your sword up already. Now if you don't have any more questions I'll go and check up on Fayt and Mirage. You need your rest for now. We don't know what Airyglyph will do now that the Thunder Arrow is nearing completion."

"Ok tell Fayt I said i'm feeling better. And can you tell me if anything happens?"

"Sure thing, to both requests." Cliff raised his thumb and gave me a grin before leaving and closing the door.

It was a few hours later when Fayt, Cliff and Nel came into my room to give me an update on the situation. Apparently Airyglyph was marching with a full force offensive to destroy Aqueria in one go.

"All soldiers capable of fighting have been requested at the front lines, to encounter the enemy at the Arias hills."

Nel's voice did not sound pleased with this development. It would mean a lot of death on both sides of the battlefield. Not to mention that the enemy had the advantage in numbers.

"So." I began, slowly sitting up, "When do we leave?"

"WE are going to leave in the morning. YOU are going to stay here and heal up." Fayt spoke up, his voice stern.

"If the man wants to join his comrades in battle, you should not stop him Master Fayt." A loud unknown voice suddenly boomed through my room.

"If he really wishes to join in our fight, he is more then welcome too. Every soldier more means a better chance of winning. Especially people of his level and name."

looking up I saw that Fayt and Cliff stepped aside to let an old man walk towards me. He was not wearing a shirt, and covering his legs was a red samurai dress. I never did figure out what those things were called. He had runological tattoo's all over his body, showing that he had mastered a great number of spells. He also had, despite being old probably fifty at least, quite an excellent physical built. Covering his face was a small beard and he was holding a sheathed sword in his left hand.

"Greetings , Master Lucifer. I am Adray Lasbard, warrior of Aqueria and I have heard many things about you." the man spoke up, this time his voice was in a normal volume.

"Pleasure to meat you Sir Adray." I greeted him back.

"No need for formalities, just Adray will do. Now let's make sure that you're capable of fighting properly. It wouldn't do to have one of our countries best fighters looking like this now would it?"

With that he raised his hands above me and started an incantation that caused all the runes on his body to glow up in a light green. There was also a bright colored orb in his hand, near my wounds. Instantly I felt my wounds feeling much better. The feeling was similar to what Nel and the other Runologists did at the Bequerel mine, only much stronger and faster.

Adray guided the glowing orb along al of my injuries a few times and I was feeling as good as new.

"I thought you said he'd need at least a few more days of continued healing and care by the medics here." Cliff looked at Nel with a look of utter surprise.

"It would, but I didn't expect Sir Adray to be back and attend to Lucifer's wounds himself. His runological power is higher then anyone else on the continent."

"Nel I've told you since you were a child." Adray's tone was sounding a little iritated about something. "Call me Adray. Sir Adray makes me feel old"

At that I couldn't help but hold back a little chuckle.

Later that afternoon I was introduced to the girl that Cliff told me about, Ameena. I was stunned when entered her room at the inn. She was an exact copy of Sophia, though a little paler. I also saw Dion sitting next to her.

"Master Fayt, Sir Lucifer. My apologies for spending so much time here. I'll return to work immediately." Apparently he thought that I was here to sent him back to work.

"Relax." It was Cliff who spoke up. "Fayt and Lucifer are only here to check up on you too. An old friend of them looks just like Ameena. Lucifer wanted to check for himself just how much they looked alike."

Ameena, who was talking with Dion when we entered looked up at that point. I noticed that even the eye color was the same as Sophia's.

"Are you all going to war? Dion told me that Airyglyph is preparing a mass attack, and all forces are sent to the battle field."

"Yeah, we are." Fayt spoke up, but he wasn't looking at Ameena, or anyone else, but he was looking at floor. Besides him I could see his fists shaking.

"I don't want to kill people. The reason I wanted to help complete the Thunder Arrow was because it could be used to pressure Airyglyph into surrender. Not this… This senseless killing. It's meaningless."

Fayt stayed in a minor depression the rest of the day. and i couldn't really blame the guy for it.

The next morning we left for Peterny, with a battalion soldiers with us. As many as could be missed in the royal city. We reached Peterny two days later.

In Peterny, Fayt, Cliff and I went to the Inventors Guild while Nel and Adray were staying with the soldiers. Upon entering the small building that housed the Inventor's Guild, I heard a girl's voice, most likely addressing us.

"Hello, welcome to the Inventor's Guild. Are you here to become an…" she stopped mid-sentence when she saw Fayt.

"Oh, you guys again. How are you doing? Your order's done and waiting for you right here. And who's your new companion? Is HE here to become an inventor?"

I looked to my left, at the source of the voice. Sitting behind a desk was a young woman, no older then twenty-five, with brown hair, tied in two ponytails that went to the sides of her head. She wore a strange black and blue dress, that seemed to push her chest up, and was holding some sort of wand with a hand at the end.

"No he's with my group actually. I was hoping you could give him one of those communicators as well." Fayt spoke to the young girl in question.

"Ok sure, here you go. Catch!" with that she suddenly tossed me a device I never expected she'd throw at me. A compact communicator. I caught it out of the sky and looked at it, blinking.

"With that you'll always be able to contact the Inventor's Guild and by the way I'm Welch Vineyard. I'll be the person you'll contact through the communicator. I'll give you all the important news, when it's still fresh!" Welch was quick to introduce herself and like before she was sounding extremely cheerful.

"So, Welch, you said my order's done? Can we have it now please? We're kind of in a hurry" Fayt asked Welch with a tone of seriousness.

"Sure thing, its right here." With that Welch pulled a packet from one of the many shelves behind her. It was wrapped in a cloak.

She pulled down the cloak to reveal my armor back in perfect shape. I quickly walked over and thanked her. with that we excused ourselves and went over to the southern exit of Peterny, were the wagon and the others were already waiting for us. We set of to Arias immediately afterwards.

We had reached Arias by nightfall and were soon in the meeting room with Clair.

"Airyglyph is marching from there royal city, with a large army. It'll be here the day after tommorw. We need to prepare for it as good as we can, while we use the time we have left. The runological weapons will all have arrived tomorrow afternoon. But it is late now. Let us discus out strategy tomorrow."

With that Clair, who was put in command of the war, dismissed the meeting. Fayt, Cliff, Adray and I needed to share a room together, due to the lack or rooms. Four beds were already arranged for us. We all went to bed soon afterwards.

A few hours later, I woke up without any particular reason. Looking around I noticed a few things. First off, I'd have trouble getting back to sleep thanks to Cliff and Adray both snoring rather loud, while Cliff had a strange grin on his face and a bit of drool running out of the corner of his mouth. The second thing I noticed was that Fayt's bed was empty. I stepped out of bed, took my sword from its standing place near the door and walked out of the room looking for Fayt.

My search soon brought me outside and behind the house. There was an empty spot of land there and Fayt was standing in the middle of it. He was holding his sword in front of him and quickly made a few slashes, while his sword was crackling with electricity. He must have been training with his 'Blade Enchantments' as he called them, trying to keep it up for longer.

Fayt returned to the same stance after 4 slashes. That was when I made my presence known to Fayt.

"That's very impressive. You must be dedicated to win this fight if you're even training this late at night"

Fayt turned around to look at me.

"Yeah, I made a promise to Ameena that I'd make sure Dion was alright. And I promised Sophia and Peppita we'd see each other again. I have to stay alive in order to keep those promises. And the only way to stay alive here is to become stronger."

"That's true, but there is only so much that you can learn from shadow sparring. If you really want to become stronger, the best way is to find a strong opponent and fight them."

"Yeah I know. But right now I'm trying to keep my Blade Enchantments for as long as possible."

"That's good, but I still think that it's better if you try it in an actual fight. I believe that, when you have to focus on attacking, defending and keeping your attack intact is when you'll reach the maximum effect. So would you like to spar with me for now?"

At that suggestion Fayt suddenly faced the ground.

"I'd love too, really. If it was sparring in the combat simulator. were we couldn't hurt each other. But too tell you the truth… I'm kind of scared about fighting you. Back, when you were fighting Albel, the both of you were moving so fast I could hardly keep up with my eyes. I think that when you're fighting against me, you defeat me before I could even strike at you"

I looked at Fayt as he was still staring at the ground. I knew I had to somehow cheer him up, but only one thing came to mind as a method for doing so.

"Fayt, did you forget? You are the one who defeated Demetrio, who had almost killed me. In a fight even when facing an enemy far superior to yourself, you should remember this: Iin a fight, all the difference can be made by a single attack. No matter how strong you are, if your head is cut of from your body, or you get pierced by a sword, you'll still die and lose. All you need in order to win is one good hit. In my fight with Albel I would have lost if I hadn't thrown that dagger into his Palm of Destruction. You can do the same to any opponent"

Fayt raised his head as I said those words.

"So if you have the ability too see through an opponents attacks, you have a good chance to win the fight no matter how much difference in skill there is. And I know the perfect way for you too learn that."

Fayt blinked at me and put his sword in a ready stance. It was only now that I noticed that the electricity never left the sword.

"We'll spar for as long as we are able. I'll fight at a level that you can keep up with, until you see through my attacks and force me to stop holding back. Whether it happens tonight or a year from now, we'll just keep on training as often as we can, so that you can become strong enough to fulfill your promises. Are you ready?"

Fayt gave a quick nod as I unsheathed my katana and got in a battle stance as well. After a split second of waiting Fayt charged at me and I did the same to him

We had closed the distance between us in a few seconds and out swords clashed. We pulled back out swords as we started something similar as to what I had done when fighting Albel.We were striking and blocking each other's strike at high speed, although I hardly had trouble defending from Fayt's attacks, I couldn't land any hits on him either.

Every time I got close to hitting him, he would either jump away or quickly bring up his sword to block my strikes.

We both jumped back to get some breathing room. We had only fought for a few minutes now but already Fayt was breathing very heavy and with one hand was clutching his head. My breath was also a bit faster then normal, but nowhere near Fayt's heavy breathing.

"Very good. Your defense is excellent. And you can alter between attacking and defending pretty good as well." I complemented Fayt's performance so far.

'Now' I thought to myself 'let's see what you do when an opponent disables your weapon'

Again I rushed at Fayt and again we both slashed. This time however my katana was in between Fayt's sword and torso. Maneuvering quickly I used my left hand to grasp his right arm, which held his sword. With my sword I slashed at Fayt.

Fayt quickly brought up his left leg and used the armor on it to stop my sword from hitting him. Then he quickly brought up his right knee as well and kicked me in the arm, forcing me to release him. I quickly kicked him with my right leg and, due to the fact that he was airborne right now, Fayt was sent flying a few feet away and made a landing in some of the bushes.

He walked out a few seconds later, stumbling and holding his head.

"I think that's enough for one night, don't you agree Fayt?"

"Yeah, if I try to keep the enchantment intact any longer I'm going to have one hell of a migraine in the morning."

I looked at Fayt's sword and saw, too my surprise, that his sword was still crackling with electricity, showing that during our spar he had continuously used his Thunder Blade.

'What's going on here?' I thought to myself. 'Fayt's Thunder Blade is supposed to give the enemy a massive shock upon contact with either the enemy or a conductor for electricity, such as steel or water. But during our entire fight I haven't once been shocked. Strange'

Suddenly Fayt crashed down to the floor in front of me.

"Fayt!" I yelled out and quickly ran to his side. he had passed out from a combination of physical exhaustion and mental stress, most likely due to his training and our spar. It was nothing a good night's sleep wouldn't fix up.

I managed to put Fayt in bed, after dragging him in firemen style, and then quickly went to bed. Unfortunately my discovery from earlier that evening was all to correct. It was very hard to get to sleep with both Cliff and Adray snoring like mad.

The next morning Clair had called a strategy meeting.

"Although the enemy has superiority in numbers, we can fight them from a distance with runological weapons. We'll use runology to deal with the Dragon Brigade, too. If we fought them head on, we'd be playing right into Airyglyph's hands. We must maintain our distance and avoid close combat at all costs. The operations begins at the break of dawn tomorrow. I want all units ready."

Following this the other commanding officers and I quickly gave an affirmative. Clair then dismissed everyone except for Nel, Fayt, Cliff Adray and myself.

She spoke up again. This time directed at only one person.

"Nel, I have a separate task for you to carry out, apart from the main force. I want you to break through enemy lines and destroy Airyglyph's command center."

Nel's only response was a one word question.

"Vox?"

"That's right." Clair then turned towards Fayt and Cliff.

"Fayt, Cliff, I'd also like to request your assistance if I may."

Cliff immediately spoke up with confidence, "Of course that's why we're here"

Fayt was also quick to answer with a simple "Sure".

"I never meant for you to become so involved in this, but..."

"We have to involve them. They're a bigger asset in combat than anyone else in my outfit. Except for Lucifer"

"Please don't worry about it. I have my own reason for wanting to fight, I want to end this war as soon as possible..."

"Right."

"Okay. Thank you, both of you. Fayt, Cliff. Please assist Nel in her operation."

Cliff and Fayt both quickly gave an affirmative to the request.

"So, Lady Clair," I started "What do Adray and I do? You didn't mention us in the Vox Elimination Team, so what are our orders?"

"Sir Lucifer Allheart, second in command of the shield legion, and Sir Adray Lasbard, the Crimson Blade, I have stationed both of you at the front lines."

At this my eyes narrowed a bit, while Adray, who had been standing in the room grinning, suddenly turned a bit more serious.

"The reason for this, is because both of you will have a massive impact upon the moral of the troops. Both out own and the enemy's. My Father's stories are already legendary and a lot of Airyglyph soldiers fears his powers. And Lucifer has defeated Albel Nox as well as two of Airyglyphs lieutenants. He is almost as famous among out soldiers as you are Father, and even more feared among the enemy's troops."

Adray gave a quick nod to show that he understood. I did the same.

"Now I have one final order to give, before I will dismiss you all. I myself am charged with the defense of the runological weapons and as such, shall not participate in the battle. Therefore Lucifer, as my second in command will have the supreme authority in the field of battle. My Father, Tynave and Farleen will serve as your direct subordinates for now and also have the authority to give orders."

Tynave and Farleen, who had been standing at the door, quickly spoke up with a "Yes ma'am!" as they saluted.

"Now you are all dismissed. Make sure that you get enough rest tonight, because tomorrow is a day of great importance."

With that each of us quietly left the seats and went outside.

After a few minutes of silence past between us, I spoke up to Fayt again.

"Hey, Fayt. Are you feeling ok again?"

"Yeah, I'm a bit nervous though"

"Shall we continue with out training then? It's the best way to get rid of unwanted nervousness"

"Sure, I need to take my mind of of things for now. Meet you at the plains at the east of town in twenty minutes ok?"

With that he left for the hall to get breakfast.

"If you guys are going to do some training, I'm going with you." Cliff was still standing next to me and had apparently decided he needed a workout as well.

"Indeed, one must never let a chance to hone skills slip. I will join you as well."

Suddenly our training group had doubled in size.

We spent the rest of the afternoon training most of the time there was at least one of us helping Fayt.

Cliff was giving Fayt some advice about moving in battle, Adray helping him hone his symbology skills. Fayt had learned some basic symbology from Nel and seemed to have a knack for using offensive Symbologie. Finally Fayt using his blade enchantments when sparring against me.

Finally, it was morning and we were al standing outside or Arias, on the Aire hills. On the other side, only a few hundred feet away from us, there stood the massive army of Airyglyph.

In the west we saw the sun rise and that was our clew. The war was about to start and it was not going to be a pretty day today.

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How did you all like that? I hope you enjoyed the Fayt vs Lucifer scène. And my first attempt at humor in this Fic. Hope you liked it. As always, please review and tell me what you think. 

Preview:

Next time: Lucifer fights side by side with Adray, Farleen and Tynave. All hell brakes loose on the battlefield and what will happen to the assassination team? Read it in the next chapter of Lucifer's Tale.


	11. Medieval Wars and Flying Fish don't mix

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Ocean or any of it's charachters. they all belong to Tri-Ace.

I hope you enjoy chapter 11 of Lucifer's Story. It's Beta-read by ThrogmortenMimic.

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Chapter 11: Medieval Wars and Flying Fish don't mix. 

In the east the sun was slowly rising, casting the entire area in a strange red and golden aura. It was at this stage that I saw hundreds of soldiers from Airyglyph on the other side of the field, slowly advancing towards us. There was a mass of soldiers, both the Black Brigade soldiers and normal foot soldiers, and from this distance I could see that above the enemy lines the dragon Brigade was hovering, waiting for the order to attack. The horsemen of the Storm Brigade were standing at both sides of the army.

Looking at our own army, I saw that Adray, Tynave and Farleen were each standing a distance away from me, each at the head of a battalion of soldiers. Most of the soldiers were shaking a bit or looking around rather nervously. Adray's face didn't betray anything other than the fact that he was focusing on the oncoming battle. Tynave was just standing, looking very cool and unnerved. Farleen was standing with her back turned towards our enemy and appeared to be cheering the soldiers up a bit.

Looking behind me, I saw my own battalion of soldiers and, standing in front of them, Fayt, Nel and Cliff. My soldiers looked the least nervous out of all of our side on the battlefield. Behind us, just outside of Arias, the runological weapons were placed on the hills allowing them to fire in an arc to reach further away. Clair and a small group of woman were standing next to the weapons. Looking at me, she gave a small nod of her head. It was the signal that the weapons were ready to fire.

"Remember guys, I'll break through the front lines for a bit to give you guys a chance to reach Vox, but I can't do any more than that. Understood?"

I looked back to see Fayt and the other two give me a small and quick nod of the head, after that I raised my hand in the sky, the signal that the army was about to move but not yet attack.

A threw my hand forward slowly, ordering the troops to walk forward without loosing formation of drawing weapons. On the other side of the field the enemy was doing the same.

When both our army's were halfway through the field I raised my hand yet again, ordering the army to stop. Silently I drew my sword from its sheath. Behind me I could hear the sounds of weapons being drawn and put ready for battle. The enemy troops were still marching forward, their weapons already drawn. I raised my sword into the sky and waited.

Some of the dragon Brigade rushed forward, trying to get the first attack in. As soon as the dragons broke the formation with the rest of their army it was raining great rays of energy for the enemy. The runological weapons had fired and some of them had hit the dragon Brigade head on. Still I waited before ordering the attack.

'As long as they stay at a distance we can attack with the weapons. I have to avoid close combat as long as possible so we can defeat as many as possible without having a chance of being harmed.'

The second volley had landed and more of the Dragon Brigade had fallen. Some of the blasts were relocated to land in the middle of the still approaching army. I raised my left hand, ordering the archers to get ready to attack the Dragon Brigade.

The dragons were getting more and more close to us. I quickly jerked my hand back down, ordering the archers to fire. And they did.

From behind our lines a rain of arrows appeared and shot at the oncoming dragons. A lot of arrows were deflected from the knights or dragon's armor or the dragon's tough skin, but a lot of arrows also hit their targets. More dragons fell down on the ground, mortally hurt. At this point only about twenty five dragons were left, instead of the hundred or so that had charged at us. All the energy emitted from the runological weapons was now focused on the approaching army.

I lowered my sword quickly, ordering the attack. Immediately Adray, Tynave, Farleen, Cliff, Fayt, Nel and I rushed towards the enemy lines. A second later the rest of the soldiers followed.

The archers shot a second rain of arrows, although much smaller this time around, towards the Dragon Brigade. Another few dragons fell. We were now only a few steps away from the dragons.

I stopped my rush and slashed upward, right into the path of the dragon right in front of me. I sliced the giant lizard's head clearly in two before it could attempt to bite me. Jumping up in a fluid motion with the slash I came down on the dragon knight, sword first. He too was dead before he could hurt me.

Looking to the sides I saw that Adray had also defeated a second dragon knight without any problems. The dragon's head looked like it was burned from the front and the sides and the knight had shards of ice stuck in his helmet, blood still on them.

Tynave and Farleen had, with the help of their battalions managed to defeat another three dragons and knights although they had lost a fair few soldiers. The same could be said for the other dragons. They had all taken at least a few soldiers with them.

Again I raised my sword to the sky as a fourth rain of arrows was shot towards the oncoming army. Another rain of energy was also shot at them. This time however they answered with a rain of arrows from their side.

As the arrows cam crashing down towards us, I could see the person leading their troops into battle. He was standing with his sword raised as well. We both lowered our swords at the same time, ordering the all out battle to start at last.

The last rain of energy was seen, being shot at the enemy's lines as both our sides rushed at each other, getting closer with each step. The enemy leader and I were running straight towards each other.

20 feet apart

15 feet apart

10 feet apart

I thrusted my sword forward, straight into the enemy leader's chest, killing him quickly and simply. At that moment, all hell broke loose.

Behind me Cliff, Fayt and Nel were standing ready to engage in battle as well. I rushed at some of the enemy troops standing near me. I killed three soldiers immediately with a horizontal slash at neck height, and immediately continued with a diagonal slash to kill a fourth soldier.

"GO!" I shouted at the others, their signal to start their own mission. Instantly Fayt and the others rushed past me, Cliff being in the lead and smashing anyone that was in their way, out of it, with many a well placed punch.

'From here on out, I can't do anything more for them. Time to focus on my own fights'

I sprinted towards the soldiers that were closest to me. Three of my own soldiers had engaged six enemy soldiers in battle. Coming from the side, I quickly killed two of them in one strike. The remaining soldiers gave me a surprised look, giving my men enough time to finish them of.

The soldiers gave me a quick nod before joining in the fight of some of the others. Looking around, I saw a big group of enemy's nearing Adray. I once again rushed over to attack.

Instead of attacking them from behind, I jumped over the entire group at once and upon landing slashed one of them in two at once. The other soldiers raised their swords at me at once.

I raised my sword in an attempt to defend myself but it proved unnecessary. A second before they could attack me strange spikes, similar to the ones that had defeated Sophia in the Battle Simulator so long ago, shot out of the ground behind me and pierced the soldiers.

Looking for the source of the spikes I saw Adray standing there, with his still sheathed sword stabbed into the ground. The point where his sheath touched the ground the spikes were started as well.

"Thanks for watching my back, but you shouldn't let your guard down like that Sir Lucifer" Adray's voice was not sounding anything close to mocking. Instead it had a certain air of gratefulness and glee too it. It seemed that Adray was amusing himself in this massive battle.

Looking past Adray, I saw that an enemy soldier was trying to attack the old man in the back. Adray was also looking past me as if he had seen something. I immediately grabbed my sword once again and thrusted forward, passing Adray between his arm and torso.

At the same time Adray had raised his hand, in which a single shard of ice had grown, and slammed it just past my head. I could feel the ice shard shoot from his hand and I heard the sound of armor being penetrated and blood shooting out of a wound behind me.

Drawing my sword back I looked behind me and I saw a Black Brigade Soldier in a state similar to the Dragon Knight that Adray had defeated. A single ice shard was sticking out of his visor and blood was shooting out from the wound.

"Thanks!" we both said to each other before running past each other to join in on some more fighting.

Up ahead of me were Tynave, Farleen and a couple of soldiers trying to fend off some of the Dragon Brigade that had stayed with the main forces. From the side a soldier from the Storm Brigade was charging in, his lance aimed at Farleen.

Thinking more on instinct than anything else, I quickly lowered myself a little during the run to pick up one of the swords from a dead soldier. Picking it up with my left hand, I quickly threw it forward to intercept the horseman before he could kill Farleen.

The sword hit its mark clearly and the soldier was thrown to the ground, lum and all. Using the element of surprise while I still had it, I lunged at the Dragon Brigade. Unfortunately, the dragon raised itself to the sky an instant before I would have killed it. It evaded a deathblow, but instead I had managed to slash on of its wings, making it drop back to the ground. Another soldier from Aquaria jumped up and killed the knight before the he had a chance to recover from the sudden drop. A second soldier slammed an axe into the Dragon's head.

"I'll take care of the Dragon Brigade, but I need a ride up. Tynave!"

I had suddenly come up with a plan. The Dragon Brigade members were al floating in a circle and at a distance that I could easily manage, if I could reach only one of them.

Running towards Tynave I pointed my left thumb upwards, indicating what I was planning. Tynave gave a nod of understanding as she quickly punched the Black Brigade Soldier that was fighting her away and turned towards me and cupped her hands together to give me a boost.

As soon as I had put my foot in Tynave's hands, she threw me upwards as I jumped from her palms. The combined force was enough to put me above the Dragon Brigade and as I was coming down I used my momentum to slash one of the knights apart, the attack also injuring the dragon.

Before the dragon went crashing to the ground, I quickly jumped of and towards a second dragon knight. He too was the victim of a quick slash aimed to kill. The soldier's dragon soon also fell towards the ground as I made my armored leg connect with its skull. Again I jumped towards another dragon and its knight.

In the jump I quickly drew the dagger from my right arm and held it in my left hand. Now I was wielding a katana in my right hand and a dagger in my left. Upon landing, my dagger was sent straight into the knight's head, while my katana pierced the dragon's skull and stabbed in its brains.

I jumped from dragon to dragon, to repeat the process of killing them. The last dragon however turned towards me and, ignoring all other enemy's, inhaled to attack me with its fiery breath.

'Crap. I can't dodge it in mid-air. And those flames will turn me into crisps.'

It was everything I could think at that moment. I was incapable of dodging or turning in the air and had no attacks to counter the dragon.

Suddenly a fountain of ice shards shot up from below the dragon and pierced him. The dragon's wings were ripped to pieces, his throat was sliced open and some of the shards even went straight through the dragon, killing the knight.

Looking below, I saw Farleen standing there with her staff held in one hand while her other hand was floating just above the top of the weapon. Both were pointing at the dragon knight that had just been shredded by ice shards.

"Are you alright Sir Lucifer?" Farleen looked at me as she was hunched over, her hands on her knees as she was trying to catch her breath.

"That was close wasn't it?" she had put up a small smile towards me, although I could easily see that she was exhausted from the spell she had cast to save me.

"Way too close. Thanks Farleen. Now you go and take a quick break for a few minutes. We'll go and see who needs some more help."

No sooner had the words left my mouth or an explosion sounded from the other side of the area. Looking up I saw that an area near Kirlsa was turned into a small crater as black smoke was rising from that spot.

'What the?' my thought were suddenly racing in my head. 'That was an explosion, but Airyglyph doesn't have the means to cause an explosion do they? And it was to big an explosion for the Runological weapons. Did Dion already finish the Thunder Arrow?'

A second explosion followed, although this time it was on our side of the battle. I had seen the blast coming this time. They were coming from the sky. I looked up and saw something I had never wanted to see, least of all on this planet.

There, floating in the sky, was a huge red spaceship. Its size alone was already about half of the entire area. All around me other soldiers, both friend and foe, were staring at the ship dumbstruck. The ship fired another blast, this time at the centre of the battle field. I paled and suddenly fear struck me. There was no way that anything on this planet was capable of taking on a Vendeeni Battle ship.

"EVERYONE! RETREAT! DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT FIGHTING THAT THING. JUST RUN!"

For a moment the soldiers around me looked at me without taking any action. Then the blast hit the ground and fear suddenly erupted all over the field. Soldiers were starting to run around looking scared, panicking. I looked around at Tynave and Farleen, who looked at me once before trying to get themselves and their soldiers heading back to Arias.

I quickly ran to one of the nearest hills. On top of that hill I could see over the entire battle field. Quickly, I raised my sword and swung it in the direction of Arias. It was the signal for the army to retreat. I noticed Adray was immediately complying with the order and was dragging several other soldiers with him. I was surprised to see that even Adray was still a soldier who obeyed the orders of his superiors without moping. Probably because he had already seen that they could not win this fight.

I quickly ran back towards Arias as well. When I arrived there I saw Dion making preparations to fire the Runological weapons at the battle ship.

"Yes... YES, FIRE! Begin the attack!" I heard him give the order to attack the ship.

"Dion don't! There's no way that we can defeat that ship. We have to… oh SHIT!"

As I was about to tell Dion that we had to retreat and hide, I saw one of the battleship's blasts coming down. And it was about to land close to us. I quickly grasped Dion's arm and turned around. Using my momentum from the short spin, I tossed Dion forward and quickly jumped after him. We were both flying over a rock that I wanted to use as shelter, but it was too late. As I was flying in the sky in front of Dion, the blast landed and an explosion occurred.

I was thrown forward and crashed with Dion in to the ground. I could feel an intents burning in my back, similar to what I felt when I was hit by Albel's Palm of Destruction only much worse.

Suddenly I heard Fayt's voice.

"What are you talking about?"

I couldn't hear all the details to well, even though Fayt and Cliff were standing close to me. My ears were still ringing from the explosion.

I tried to look up, so I could see what was going on everywhere, but my body would hardly move. The explosion had certainly taken its toll on my body.

By the time I had my head raised so I could see what was going on, I heard Fayt yell out, though not to anyone in particular it seemed.

"Who-who the hell am I!"

At that point something happened that I never would have imagined. Suddenly, Fayt's eyes went glassy and a lot of wind seemed to be flowing off of him. There was a lot of light and suddenly some sort of angel appeared from Fayt's body and, from her hand, shot some kind of ray that completely destroyed the battle ship. I was still lying there, looking shocked at what just happened. I kept looking at the place were the ship had been only minutes before, almost as if expecting it to return.

From the corner of my eye I suddenly saw Fayt falling to the floor. He was completely exhausted after such an outburst of… whatever it was.

When Fayt's head touched the ground, something strange happened yet again. From the place where his head connected a golden wave was flowing. It was coming towards me, but I couldn't dodge it. I still couldn't move.

As soon as she shockwave reached me I saw something. Four images.

A man with white hair that reached down to the small of his back was sitting on the ground. His hair was tied in a ponytail. In his hand he was holding what seemed like the handle of a sword, but there was no blade attached. His clothing was similar to what I was wearing, although his armor was colored blue, like the ocean. On his torso armor a large ice crystal was shown. He looked at me, with blue eyes and he was smiling. He looked tired, yet happy. From what I could see he looked no older then 19, maybe 20.

The second image was that of a woman lying there. I could see a part of what my own body lying next to her. She was a beautiful woman, with really long, fiery red hair that was lying all over the bed, and she looked like she was about the same age as me. Some of her hair even reached down to her feet. She was looking at me with her red eyes, eyes that seemed to radiate passion. She was smiling at me too and it was then that I noticed that we were naked.

The third image was filled with three people, standing in front of me. The white haired male from the first image was standing facing me. I could now see just how tall he really was. He could easily stand above Cliff with well over a head of difference. His posture for the rest seemed pretty normal. He was standing with his left hand resting on the hilt of his sword. He was grinning as his right hand was ruffling up the hair of one of the two women standing with him.

Next to him, stood the red-haired woman and it was now that I could see that her hair did indeed reach down to her ankles, yet none of it was in her face. She was also wearing armor similar to mine, although her armor was red, like her hair, and in the torso had the image of a flame on it. She was leaning on her sword, which was still sheathed, as she watched the other two people with a smile on her face. The smile was different from the one she had given me though. The smile she had here was one of amusement, while in the other image it had been one of love. I noticed one thing that was new to her armor. The other male and I had nothing on the armor of our arms, yet she had what appeared to be blades attached to them. They reached up the length of her arm. It was put up in such a way that, if she were to give a punch and miss, the blades would hit and cut.

The third person was someone new. I had not seen her before, yet for some reason she (just like the other two) felt familiar, as if I had known her for a long time. She had brown hair that was cut in a strange style. It was long at the front, reaching down to below her chin, but as it reached further back it became shorter.She looked younger then the others, maybe 16 or 17 years old. She had eyes that were brown, just a bit darker then her hair. Like the other two, she was also wearing armor and clothing similar to mine, although hers were brown and had the image of a rock at the torso. At her side, just like it was with me and the other two she had a katana strapped at her belt. Like the red-haired woman had the blades attached to her arms, this woman had something that was different as well. Attached to her arms, fists and lower legs were what appeared to be spikes. The kind that Tynave had on her gloves as well. The kind that, when you give the opponent a punch or kick, easily penetrate skin and can kill.

The brunet was giving the white haired man an annoyed look as he was ruffling his hand through her hair. She was significantly shorter than the other two. I would guess she was about half a head shorter then Sophia, while the red-haired woman was about as tall as Nel was. She had a rather normal posture, just like the man had. It was clear with all three of these people though, that they were quite strong and had some toned muscles underneath their clothes. She was swatting away the white haired man's arm, with the inside of her own arm most likely to prevent hurting him, as she had put up what seemed like an irritated look, though there was a spark of amusement in her eyes.

To my eyes it seemed as if they were just a bunch of teenagers having a good time together.

The last image was the most shocking one here. I saw the red-haired woman from the images before, crashing to her knees. Blood was shooting out from a wound that ran clear across her torso. From her right thigh up to her left shoulder. The gash had struck her heart, and she was dying.

I noticed as I watched the scene, that she had her sword drawn. Also there was something strange. Both her sword as well as her arm blades looked like they were on fire, but the fire was being reduced. It must have had something to do with the fact that she was dying.

Then as quickly as they came, the images left. I had them engraved into my memory as I watched Cliff pick up Fayt and Nel and Adray walking towards Dion and me.

* * *

As always, please review and give comments whether you like the story or not. Till next Time. 

Preview for chapter 12:  
The Vendeeni Battleship has been destroyed by Fayt, but are all the Vendeeni really gone from Elicoor2? And what will happen with Fayt and Lucifer now that Fayt has shown such power and Lucifer has seen those images? Find out in the next chapter of Lucifer's Tale.


	12. meeting the boss

Author's note: i have a few things i want to say before the chapter.

1: I have a new Beta Reader. this chapter was Beta-read and edited by Illusion Sky and ThrogmortenMimic. a lot of thanks to both of them for helping me with my Grammar and checking up on the story. 2: As you will notice in the very first line, from this chapter onwards the PoV will be changed to a more general one. I've done this because i find it easier to use when descriping things and some other stuff later on.  
3: I have recieved a few PM's about this and ClaudeLv250 also mentioned it in his review. I am well aware the my OC's name is Lucifer, which is the Japanse name for Luther. i know what i'm doing and i chose the name for a reason. all will be revealed later on in the story.

now anyway, on with the story.

* * *

Chapter 12: Meeting the Boss

A few hours later Cliff, Adray, and Lucifer were riding a carriage, controlled by Nel. Inside the carriage, there were unconscious Arias soldiers, Dion, and Fayt, who still had not woken up after the strange events on the battlefield. Both Aquaria and Airglyph had suffered massive damage and left. This was not the time for wars.

Everyone was quiet. No one had recovered from the shock of what happened on the battlefield. Suddenly, Cliff spoke to Lucifer, breaking the nasty silence. "You do know that Welch isn't going to be pleased right?"

Lucifer glanced at his ruined armor. He remembered Adray dumping it on the carriage after the explosion. The back was completely molten and the wound on his back was a proof that he wasn't toying it around. Fortunately Adray, Nel, and Clair had healed the most out of it and it would be healed completely in a few days. The problem was the armor.

"She'll be happy that we guild her work in a short time. But unfortunately, she'll be mad that I got it ruined it so soon." He answered, not caring right now. The visions he saw earlier was drastically haunting him. 'Who were those people?' he thought, 'Why were they dressed similar to me? Do I know them?'

While he was in his midst of his own world, Cliff yelled in his ears. "If you would please be kind enough to WAKE UP!"

Lucifer jumped and stared at Cliff in a dumbstruck. "Huh? What?"

"You could get your armor fixed and face the wrath of Welch since we're in Peterny. I want to reach Aquios TODAY." Said Cliff as Lucifer looked around in daze. He was so deep in thought that he hadn't even noticed that they had reached Peterny.

"Right. I'll be back." He said, grabbing his armor and jumping out of the carriage.

"We'll be back in one hour. We need to replace these Lums if we want to reach Aqious A.S.A.P." With that, Cliff led the carriage to another part of town.

As Lucifer pushed open the door, he immediately heard Welch's cheerful voice. "Hi, you're back. Great timing, we had your order in." She turned back and examined the shelves behind which was full of boxes. After a few minutes of looking through, she pulled out a small box and hand it over to him. Lucifer hastily opened the box and unwrapped it. He realized that it was the fourth dagger of the set, to replace the one he had lost when he fought against Albel.

After testing the weight and the feel of the dagger, he put it back, eager to test it for real. "Looks good Welch, how about the payment?"

"Already taken care of." Welch answered. "Fayt paid it before giving the order, so there's no problem." Her eyes suddenly turned a bit darker as she got a better look at him. "Hey, why aren't you wearing your armor? The one we had it fixed a few days ago?"

Lucifer looked down, not knowing what to say, "Well, you see, I kind of had some trouble again and…well," he looked at her, "It's…not in the best of states right now." With that, he raised the armor so she could see it.

She was silent for a moment, after seeing the completely ruined Mythril armor. Lucifer, who didn't like the silence, spoke up. "Well, at least I'm ALIVE."

Welch chuckled. "I think you've broken the record of destroying a Mythril armor this quickly." She said, broadening her grin. "Oh well, it doesn't matter. We just had a new shipment of Mythril so it shouldn't take the blacksmiths more then a few days to get your armor fixed up. It'll be expensive though."

Lucifer was glad that she was still her cheerful self, but they both nearly jumped as she was telling how much it would cost. He suddenly realized something that might be a major problem. Or it IS a major problem. "Wait. I just realized that I don't have any fol with me. Is it possible that I pay after getting the armor back?"

"No, I'm afraid I can't do that. We have to get the payment in advance so we can pay the blacksmiths and everything. If you don't have any money with you, I'm afraid I can't do anything-,"

"BOOM"

With a loud bang, the door to the inventor guild was opened roughly. Lucifer turned around expecting to find some insane weirdo that had just stormed in, but instead, Adray walked in. He looked around the room until he saw Lucifer. The instant he saw him standing there with the ruined armor, Adray spoke, loud and fast.

"Cliff told me that you were going to get your armor repaired here, but no need. When we reach Aquious, I'll contact some old friends of mine. They'll have your armor fixed up in no time and for no cost. It's the least we can do for a hero of our country."

With that, Adray walked back out into the streets again leaving Lucifer, who was standing across the dumbfound Welch, who didn't had a chance to say anything to Adray.

"Well," she started abruptly, "I guess that solves your money problem for now. Do come back next time you're in need of some inventor help. Remember, we do more than just repair your weapons. If you ever need to have a meal or new clothes, just give us a call."

"Yeah, thanks." With that, Lucifer walked out of the guild, armor still in his hand, and went to the northern exit of Peterny.

---

Lucifer's thoughts were once again, filled with the same images. A red-haired woman, a brown-haired girl, and a white-haired man. 'Who were they? Where have I met them? Why did I feel like I've known them when I can't remember anything about them? Why was I in bed with that red-haired woman, and why were we naked? Was she my lover? Maybe my wife or even my mother? And if they were my memories from what point in time were they? 'Completely lost in thought, he didn't even notice that time was passing very quickly.

His deep thoughts were interrupted, once again, by none other than Cliff Fitter. "WAKE UP!" Lucifer look up, not looking surprised at all. "How often are you planning to space out like that? I thought you'd be the type to stay alert on all times. What got you so distracted all of a sudden?"

"…Nothing important." He replied plainly. Cliff was a good person and no doubt, he would be a great friend, but the man was much more intelligent than he had acted and still had his own hidden agenda. Lucifer didn't trust him enough to tell him yet. "Just some things I needed to think about. It won't happen again."

'I was already caught off guard two times today. I can't let it happen again. I'll just have to be patient for now. In this situation, I have to stay alert to anything, anytime. i swear, as soon as I'm of this planet I'm going to try and figure this out, but for now, I'll have to put it on low-priority." Having decided not to think about the images until they had reached safer grounds, he threw his armor in the carriage and jumped in after.

Nel immediately set course to Aquious.

---

After reaching Aqious, Nel went to report the queen, Cliff went to check on Mirage and Ameena, Adray had brought all the wounded people to the infirmaries or other places where they could rest and recover, leaving Lucifer alone. He decided to try his new dagger while waiting for Adray, who would take him to see the blacksmith later this afternoon.

Lucifer walked to the yard behind the castle and seeing that it was empty, he put away his katana and his ruined armor for now. He pulled out two of his daggers and started to move around with them a bit, slashing and stabbing into invisible enemies. It was just like feeling his katana for his first time. He didn't think about the movements. He just let his body do as it please and felt his own movements. Apparently, his body was trained so well, he didn't need a mind for his forms. And unlike his visions, his body was not affected with amnesia.

As he continued to stab and slash the air, he also made midair tricks and defensive movements and whatever his body would lead him to do. He was so focused that he lost his feelings for his surrounding and time. After what felt like mere minutes to him, he performed a back flip and at the turning point, threw his daggers towards a tree. The 'dance' had ended with both daggers pierced into the tree halfway up the blade. Upon stopping the practice dance, Lucifer regained the feeling for his surrounding and to his surprised, there were applauses coming from behind. Looking up, he saw that few runologists, some soldiers, and Adray gathering and they were clapping hands.

"Damn boy, with skills like that, you could put half of the Crimson Blades to shame."

Adray said, advancing towards him. "Anyway, I've made some arrangements to have your armor fixed up. Where did you leave it?"

"Over there, against the tree," Lucifer answered, pointing to where he had left his armor.

"Right. I'll go get it fixed. See you in a bit." With that, he walked picked up the armor, settled it under his arms, and walked away. Most of the soldiers that had gathered were still standing, looking in awe.

Lucifer picked up his katana, pulled out his daggers from the tree, which was more difficult then expected, and walked out of the garden.

---

Apparently, Adray had put the fixing of Lucifer's armor on high priority. Either that or the blacksmiths in Aquios were very skilled, because it was only afternoon the next day that he got his armor back, completely repaired. In the meantime, he had checked up on most of the other people. Fayt was just suffering from sheer exhaustion and strain on his body. Mirage said it's only a matter of time before he wakes up soon.

Dion was a different case. His whole body was damaged from the explosion and it didn't respond well to the blow. With the use of runology, the doctors had managed to heal him up for a great deal, but he still had a few bruised ribs. It would still heal with time, if he didn't strain himself too much, but it would not be a pleasant recovery.

Mirage reported Ameena's status that she was feeling better. She forced her to take rest and good food which helped her recover, but Mirage still feared that her lungs wouldn't hold out more than a few weeks. If she didn't strain herself, she would 'still' live for a few years, but it was most likely impossible for her to recover completely at this planet's healing equipment level, even with the help of runology.

After checking on everyone else, with nothing to do, he decided to go back to the library once again. He was getting very interested in the prophesies that had been made by Apris and his religion. It was the following morning that Fayt woke up.

---

Nel was the first to speak. "Oh…you're awake. What a relief, I thought you might never wake up again."

Without much effort, Fayt managed to sit up on the bed. "Where am I?"

"Castle Aquaria. It looks like the Airglyph soldiers went back home too. Now's not the time for war." Cliff replied.

"And the Vendeeni?"

"You don't have to worry about them, they're gone." It was Lucifer who gave the answer. Nel spoke as soon he had finished.

"And how are you feeling Fayt?"

"I'm all…argh…I'm aching all over!" he replied. Then he stopped to think for a second, then spoke again. "Dion! Is Dion okay?"

"He's taken a big hit and his body isn't reacting so well. We don't know that many information, but he'll be alright," Said Cliff looking at Lucifer. "Luckily, he had Lucifer there to act like a human shield and take the brunt of the blast."

In the depth of his heart, Lucifer silently thanked the Mythril plate. He probably wouldn't have survived without his armor.

"That's good to hear. I promised Ameena I'd make sure he'd get home safely."

"Yes," Nel spoke up, "but for now, you should get some rest. Stay in bed for a while."

Fayt nodded and laid his head back on his pillow and almost instantly fell back asleep.

In the afternoon, Fayt had woken up and he was feeling a lot better. Lucifer was once again, heading to the library to learn more about runology, and the prophesies. A few hours later he got tired of the reading and went to his room when he suddenly noticed one of the soldiers running toward the guest room where Fayt and Cliff were staying in. He was yelling something about a weapon in the sky before Cliff suddenly sprinted out the door, past Lucifer and in the direction of the stairs. Fayt and Nel also ran out of the room behind him, taking just enough time for Fayt to yell at Lucifer there was 'trouble'. Quickly turning around, Lucifer ran after them.

When they reached the balcony watching over the White Dew Garden, Lucifer looked up to see what the 'weapon in the sky' was. Only one though forced its way into his head.

'Oh no, not again,'

Behind him, Mirage and the queen arrived as well. He heard Nel and the queen talk for a bit while he was still looking up at the Vendeeni Battleship. More talking and it sounded like Cliff was getting angry over something. Suddenly, Lucifer saw something that he thought was strange.

"Hey guys," said Lucifer pointing on the object. "What's that little spacecraft doing there?"

Everyone looked up as Cliff smirked. "It's them, finally."

Looking up, they saw the little spacecraft shooting at the Vendeeni battleship. The Vendeeni shot back and both ships were going down with explosions. All of a sudden, a familiar transporting noise came from behind and a feminine voice spoke.

"Sorry to keep you waiting." The voice said.

Cliff immediately responded. "Hey, took you long enough."

Looking ahead of him, they saw a girl around Fayt's age with blue hair and eyes. She was wearing clothes that seemed completely out of this planet. She was wearing black stocking which covered her legs, and a small black skirt similar to Nel. She also had unusual chest armor with black boots. Her lower back was covered with part of her coat which was separated from the top. Around her waist, she had a metal belt that held her coat in place and tied a gun to her back.

"Is it even possible to transport to a place like this?" Cliff asked ignoring the others.

"I scanned the situation before coming in, so I had a good idea what to expect. At least, now that this planet's part of the mess, we don't have to hide anything anymore."

"True enough. But I bet you that Mr. Super-Square, champion of the UP3 would disagree with you."

"Hah hah, very funny," said Fayt. He didn't sound like he was finding the joke very amusing though. "Who's the girl?"

"Ah, yeah. Sorry. I'm slacking in my introductions. This here is the leader of Quark."

At this, both Fayt and Lucifer had a bit of a shock. This girl, that looked just as old as Fayt, was the leader of the anti-federation?

"What?"

"I'm Maria Traydor. But please, call me Maria." Her introduction was short and simple.

Fayt, who was still in a shock, introduced himself to her, but Maria interrupted him and fired facts about him. She gave Fayt a simple answer of doing some research as Nel walked closer to them.

"So Cliff, who are all the people standing with us here?" Maria asked, looking around at all the individuals gathered around them.

"Right, where are my manners?" Cliff gave a dramatic slap to his forehead.

"Maria," he started, "Allow me to introduce you. This red-headed hot babe is Nel Zelpher"

Suddenly Nel's eyes narrowed very dangerously as she glared daggers at Cliff and she gave of a very threatening "Cliff…"

Cliff simply shrugged it of.

"Last time you were complaining about being called a chick, so now I thought I'd try calling you babe this time."

Fayt had to suppress a little laugh at that comment, while everyone else just looked confused about the conversation.

"The big guy with the beard, who nearly matches me in muscle but is nowhere near my good looks, is Adray Lasbard. Nel's a spy, secret agent and assassin for this kingdom and Adray's is its best soldier."

"Going on," Cliff continued unfazed by Nel's glare, "the beauty in white is the Queen of Aquaria and the tall guy in the robes is her Magistrate, Lasselle."

Maria gave a polite (but very small) bow as she greeted the queen.

"Pleasure." She said in the general direction of the Elicorians. "You've made quite a few high placed friends in your short time here Cliff."

"You know me; everyone just wants to be my friend"

"Sure. But there's still one person you haven't introduced me to. Who's the silver haired guy in black and what's his job on this planet?"

Suddenly Cliff gave of a very big grin. He had no doubt waited in introducing Lucifer for another dramatic effect.

"The guy's got amnesia. He doesn't know his own name either, but he adopted a name. This is Lucifer Allheart. He's one of the commanders of Aquaria's armies, but…"

Cliff made a small pause.

"He's like us." He continued quickly, looking at Maria to see the look on her face.

At this Maria's eyes went wide. She had obviously not expected that Lucifer was an offworlder as well.

"And let me add a side-note" Cliff was acting as if he had just remembered something "you do not want to fight this guy. He's unbelievable." He said the last part with a huge grin on his face and was rewarded with Maria looking rather skeptical at him.

"Is somebody going to explain this?" Nel suddenly spoke up again. "What's going on? Who is she and how did she appear here? So, I take it you're not all from Greeton after all? Come on, answer me. No more concealing the truth." She sounded very confused, scared and ready to battle at the same time, as if the others would suddenly turn traitor against her.

"That is enough, Lady Nel." The queen's order was simple, but her voice also showed that she was confused as well.

"But, Your Majesty…" Nel began to protest, but the queen interrupted her again.

"I said that is enough."

"…Yes, Your Majesty."

With that, the Queen walked closer to Maria.

"I know not who you are, but it is certain that you are one of their acquaintances. I would hear an explanation of you now, one that makes sense to my ears."

The Queen spoke in a way that sounded kind, yet as demanding as it could be. No doubt this was one of the many things that the Queen would be skilled at. Political and social control.

"Please forgive my rudeness, your Majesty, but would it be all right if we talked among ourselves first? We have a lot of catching up to do. I will explain all of the details and how the facts are connected afterwards; I promise."

"…So be it. Sir Lucifer, show them to the conference room."

"Of course, your majesty." He answered immediately and with that the group turned to go to the conference room.

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Maria is here and next chapter Fayt will find out why the Vendeeni are after him. i'll try to update it a bit quicker this time around. anyway, as always please review. Constructive criticism is welcome as it will only improve my writing. 


	13. Truth revealed

A/N: before you start reading this chapter i would like to give a big Thank you to Illusion Sky. he has done me 2 big favors. he has been kind enough to Beta-read this chapter and he has also helped me out with a major problem. i was using the Script FAQ on GameFAQS(dot)com, but it was missing a piece of the script(the piece from the end of this chapter till the end of Kaddan). he has kindly started a new game and gave me the Script so i could continue this story. it may take a while before Chapter 14 is complete but intill then please enjoy Chapter 13. as always please leave a review telling me if you liked it or not. i hope to get a lot of tips on my writing to improve even more. Thank you for reading this.

Disclaimer: i don't own anything used in this story(with the exception of Lucifer), everything belongs to Tri Ace, i am just using their characters to write a story.

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Chapter 13: Truth revealed

As soon as everyone had entered the conference room, Cliff closed the door behind him and took a seat. Everybody was a bit nervous. With this current condition, anyone would. Wanting to ease his emotion and get used to this 'boss' as soon as possible, Fayt spoke.

"Um… Miss Traydor?" his voice was still kind of weak.

"Please, just Maria's fine. If I may call you Fayt." She sounded bit kinder but still every bit in command.

"Oh, all right then. Maria, please tell me what happened. Why did the Vendeeni capture my dad? Why are they after me? ...What is it about me that they're so interested in?" Fayt was speaking very fast. Obviously wanting answers to questions that have been haunting him for a while.

"Relax, there's no need to rush things, and there's much to explain. But first..." Maria turned towards Cliff before finishing her sentence. "His powers manifested, didn't they?"

"They did, just once. There were a few occasions where he almost manifested, but so far he's only really used his powers once. He was stronger than expected. Particularly, his destructive capabilities are far beyond yours." Cliff's answer was in a voice that told everyone that the time for fun and games was over. He was actually dead serious.

"And his memory?" Maria questioned him again and was answered by in the same serious tone.

"Nah. The whole thing was completely wiped form his mind."

"I see..." Maria looked like she was thinking about something.

'What are they talking about here? I don't follow at all' Fayt and Lucifer's mind were filled with confusion. They absolutely had no idea what they were talking about.

"What in the world are you guys talking about?" Fayt asked.

"Just a moment. First, I have some new information. It's not exactly good news..." Maria made a small pause, as if thinking of how to say the next few words. No one in the room said anything waiting for Maria to bring the news.

"You know," she began, "that your father, Professor Leingod, was captured by the Vendeeni, right?"

"Yes..."

"We have learned, after investigating the situation, that your friend, Sophia, was captured as well." Maria finished in a not- regretting- at- all tone.

Fayt and Lucifer both gasped at. Fayt yelled immediately in surprise.

"What!?"

"They grabbed her after you escaped from the Helre." Maria's explanation was very calm. She was the opposite of Fayt right now.

"They got Sophia!?" he looked at Maria. The look on his face was begging her to tell him it was all a stupid joke, but all she did was nod.

"Noooo!!!" Fayt's voice sounded both angry and scared all of a sudden. Whose damn fault is it that all this calamity was happening?

"But what do the Vendeeni want with them!?" Fayt had managed to vocalise Lucifer's thought almost exactly.

Maria answered, sounding like she was taking pity on Fayt, acting almost as if he was a young child that asked the difference between good and bad. "You really have no idea, do you?"

"So tell me what's going on!" Fayt almost cried out. Neither he nor Lucifer was making much sense about what they were saying, but Fayt was the one who had asked first about it.

"I'll tell you, but are you sure that we can trust him?" Maria pointed a finger at Lucifer as she asked Cliff.

"I trust the guy enough to watch my back. He doesn't seem like the kind of guy that would betray us. Besides he's also a friend of the Leingods and of this Sophia girl. He said he wanted to help us out, so if he's going to be part of the rescue team, he might as well know what's going on right?" Cliff answered in a smirk.

Lucifer smiled back and whispered so Maria couldn't hear. "Don't say that. Now I CAN'T betray you."

"Fine." Maria jerked her head back to Fayt without much care to Lucifer. "Your father took it upon himself to carry out forbidden research."

"Forbidden research?" Fayt sounded dumbstruck. Lucifer found it hard to believe too. Robert Leingod didn't seem like a man to do forbidden stuff. Then again, he had only known the man for a few weeks.

"That's right. He researched and designed a genetically modified, living weapon-forbidden by the laws of the Pangalactic Federation."

Maria sounded quite angry. It was the sort of anger that was not directed at anyone present, more to something that she had thought about suddenly. All the while Lucifer was trying to think about what was going on.

'Why would she sound angry about it? Is it because she's the leader of an anti-federation organisation? If she's right, the federation could have some pretty powerful weaponry indeed.'

But of course, Fayt refused to believe. "My father? I can't believe it!"

"Of course he didn't talk about it. Other than those involved, only the top levels of the Federation government knew anything." Maria answered, Fayt and Lucifer couldn't tell if she was still angry or she had regained her calmness.

"Then how come you know about it?" Fayt sounded like he was trying to convince himself that she made it all up.

"I was one of his...guinea pigs." As Maria said it, she turned her head down looking at the floor. She was obviously ashamed and angry because of it.

'I guess that's also a possibility. She doesn't look anything different from a normal girl though.' Lucifer thought. Fayt-objected it.

"What...?" Fayt was once again, dumbstruck.

"I'll never forgive them." Maria's voice was lased with anger, sounding venomous.

"My dad... I-I can't believe this! Living weapons? You...a guinea pig? You just look like an ordinary girl!"

"Exactly. Watch this."

With that Maria turned on the spot and walked over to the desk standing against the wall. She pulled three vases that were standing on the desk together and held her hand over the middle one. Suddenly her hand had some strange symbols around them that connected to the vase. It started to glow on contact.

With that she turned back from the desk and took a few steps.

'What's she planning on doing?' Lucifer was pretty curious about everything that was going on. 'She's managed to make a vase glow, but what's she proving with that?'

Lucifer was dragged from his thoughts when Maria suddenly pulled out the gun strapped to her waist and shot three times. Each shot hit a vase and two of them broke into pieces. The one that Maria had made to glow was still in one piece.

'What the hell? How on earth did she do that?' Lucifer and Fayt thought looking totally surprised.

"What!?" Fayt was the only one to give a vocal reaction.

"This is the power I received from the symbological genetic modifications that Professor Leingod and his lab performed on me. I possess the ability to manipulate the structure of matter. So...still think I'm an ordinary girl?"

Maria explained and almost dared Fayt to say yes.

"You still look ordinary to me." Lucifer's words had left his mouth before he even noticed it. He instantly regretted it.

"What did you say?" Maria's voice had instantly turned ice-cold at Lucifer's statement. The glare she was giving him showed just how much she thought of him.

"I said that you still look like an ordinary girl to me." Lucifer was not at all pleased with the tone she was taking at him. She had only just met him and already she was constantly showing obvious distrust in him and at the same time acting like she was his boss or something. Those two things do not combine well in his mind.

"I'll tell you something pal," she started to make a threat but was soon interrupted by Fayt asking a simple question.

"But...why would my father do such a thing?" asking like he was finally convinced after what he saw.

Maria had quickly turned her attention back to Fayt, completely ignoring Lucifer. "And not just to me."

"What?" Fayt asked.

"I wasn't the only one they modified. Another came before me-I was the second subject."

Fayt looked shocked to hear that his Father had done an illegal experiment twice. "What are you saying?"

"The first subject" at that point she hesitated for a bit and drew some breath, "was you."

Okay, that was really random. Words wouldn't come out of Fayt, but he managed to find it after a few seconds. "Me? The first subject? What are you talking about? My dad would never do something like that to me!"

Fayt was suddenly talking like Maria was making it all up. This was probably just the last drop to confuse Fayt and he was trying to convince himself that she was just making up a bad joke at his expense.

"I can understand if you don't believe me. Your power hasn't fully awakened yet. But if I'm not telling the truth, can you explain the thing for me? Who knocked that Vendeeni battleship out of the sky? Why are the Vendeeni so relentless in going after you and everyone else related to the Leingods? Everyone who was there knows the answers to these questions... Everyone but you, that is."

"Actually, not everyone knows why the Vendeeni are after him and all that. I only know what happened to the Vendeeni ship the other day." Lucifer interfered all of a sudden.

"Nobody ever asked you anything so just stay quiet." Maria's voice had instantly turned ice-cold again as she turned around to face Lucifer.

"I was just correcting a statement made by you, Maria. You were the one that said that everyone here knew the answers to all the questions but I don't."

"To you, I'm Miss Traydor. And I don't need you to interfere when I'm busy explaining things."

"Well, Miss _Traydor_," his voice was also laced with sarcasm as he almost spat out her name, "to me it just looks like you're trying to confuse Fayt. So far I have seen no evidence that Fayt's dad is the one responsible for your ability to make a vase bullet-proof. In fact, I don't even see the big deal of it all anyway."

"Then tell me of one other scientist who has a research centre on moon base #5, who has the knowledge needed to perform these kinds of experiments and who would have the chance to experiment on Fayt." Her response was almost shouted out at him.

"I don't have a clue as to who could, but that again I would know would I? The only professor I know is Fayt's dad. And correct me if I'm wrong, because I only know that justice system of this planet, but isn't the concept of guilty till proven innocent kind of old?" Lucifer yelled right back at her.

"Hey Guys, knock it off." Cliff stepped in between the both of them to stop the fight. This conversation was heading nowhere. "Lucifer, listen to me for a second here. We have evidence that it was Robert Leingod who conducted the experiments. We just don't have them here on this planet. We'll rescue him and then prove to you that we are right. First things first. And I may trust you enough as it is, but I can't have you trying to start fights with Maria ok? She has the ability to make sure you're stuck on this planet all you life. Now Maria please continue."

"Very well. As long as he doesn't interfere again," she shot another glare at Lucifer and then, after receiving a look from Cliff, turned her attention back to Fayt.

"I know you don't want to admit it, but there's only one truth. I'm going to steal the Professor and everyone else back from the Vendeeni and ask him why he did what he did. But to do this, I need your help, Fayt. I can't do it alone..."

Fayt just looked at her like she was crazy.

"I wouldn't expect you to object to saving your father and Sophia... I know how important they are to you."

"Of course I want to rescue them. They mean everything to me."

With that Fayt turned away to think everything over.

"Fayt," Lucifer began, "I hate to be the one to say this but. It seems that Miss Traydor here is the only way we can save Sophia and your dad."

Although he already didn't like this Maria he still had a debt to repay to Dr. Leingod for saving his live back on HydaIV. Sophia and Fayt were his also friends. You're supposed to help your friends right? Even if it did mean working together with someone like Maria.

Fayt turned around, looking surprised at Lucifer and quickly making a decision.

"All right. I'll help you."

"All right, now that we're decided..." Maria started but was suddenly silenced by Cliff raising his hand as Lucifer also tensed up and reached a hand for his sword. Standing crouched, ready to quickly draw his sword he looked at the door that Cliff was now sneaking to, silent as a cat.

Suddenly Cliff pulled the door open and revealed Nel standing behind it, listening, with Adray standing somewhere behind her.

"Nel!" Fayt was obviously not expecting Nel to be standing on the door listening in on the conversation.

"It doesn't matter if she heard us." Was all Maria said. Cliff poked his head out the door for a bit and looked around.

"Hey, where's the old man?"

"What do you mean Cliff?" Nel spoke like she didn't know anything. But she wasn't that good with her semi-calm voice.

"Come on Nel, don't try to fool me. I just KNOW that Adray is also hanging around here somewhere, joining you with listening in on us." Said Cliff with a broad smile.

"Am I really that predictable boy?" Adray's voice boomed through the hallway. Suddenly he stepped into sight from behind a pillar.

"No, I just figured that with your loud personality, you'd be pretty nosy. And pretty curious as well."

"Right in one!" Adray exclaimed sounding quite cheerful as always.

With that everyone walked into the room and Cliff picked up the conversation like there was no interruption at all.

"So, how are we getting off this rock?"

"I made arrangements." Maria started, "I came in a small ship to avoid the Vendeeni. The

Diplo will be arriving later. Everything else is up to Marietta's skills."

"Your preparations are thorough, as always." Cliff complimented Maria.

"Yes, well, we still have a lot of problems to deal with."

"That's right." Fayt started, "Even if your ship can make it, how do we know the Vendeeni

won't interfere?"

"Your right." Maria took a minute to think things over for a bit and then spoke up again, "Entering orbit, transporting, and warping out will take a total of five minutes."

"Even our flagship will have trouble withstanding five minutes of concentrated fire from the Vendeeni." Mirage spoke up. It was true. The Vendeeni's technology seemed slightly powerless compared to the federation(well, maybe), but this here, it is all up to the skills of the 17th century's UP3.

"Exactly." Maria answered, "The ideal solution would be to create some diversion from the ground as well. But...with the technology available on this planet, that will be difficult. Still, we must think of something."

Cliff gave of a sudden shrug. "If only Fayt could control his power." He commented lazily.

"Even I can't completely control my power." Maria answered Cliff and then went back to thinking again. "Either way, we need a sure thing if we're going to pull this off. Mirage, what's the strongest and most effective weapon on this planet? I'm not saying we need to use it to break through the Vendeeni shield. All we'd need to do is buy some time while they revaluate our military capabilities."

"The strongest weapon on the planet is the Thunder Arrow. The runological weapon made by Dion. It's not actually been used yet though." Lucifer spoke up before Mirage could answer. "But," he continued, "if we can get permission from Dion and the Queen, we might be able to make it work and be powerful enough to fight against the Vendeeni."

"Mirage is that true?" Maria had quickly looked at Mirage for verification of the facts that Lucifer had just said.

Mirage gave a firm nod.

"All right. Then let's start making preparations immediately." Said Maria.

"Well there's one problem." Lucifer started. Maria turned around and looked at him.

"What would that be then?" she asked in a way-too-sweet voice, as if talking to a toddler.

"It's still under development right now." Said Fayt in a there's-still-hope-tone even in the situation. "And besides that, I doubt the range is long enough to reach the Vendeeni ships. And like Lucifer said, we'd need permission from Dion and the Queen."

"When you say the Vendeeni," Nel started, "do you mean the ones from before?"

Nel walked over to Fayt and looked him into the eyes, searching for any signs of a lie.

"That's right." He answered.

"They're coming back?" Nel now sounded worried.

"There's no doubt of that." Maria answered.

"And you need our Thunder Arrow to fight them?"

"That's about the size of it." Said Cliff.

"All right, I'll talk to the queen about it."

"Huh? Are you sure?" Fayt was sounding surprised and a bit hopeful as well.

"Honestly," Nel started, "I don't really understand the situation. One thing I do know: if that celestial ship comes back again, it will cause another catastrophe. And...I believe the three of you are worthy of my trust."

"Besides," Adray suddenly said, "Lucifer's an officer of the army of Aqueria. Therefore he's got the right to use our country's weaponry. Runological weapons included."

"Oh yeah?" Lucifer sounded surprised.

"Thank you." Fayt looked at both Nel and Adray with a small smile on his face.

"Regardless, we did promise the queen that we'd explain the situation to her." Cliff said.

Fayt gave a sigh. "I don't think she'll be as easy to convince."

"Well you heard Adray. Lucifer is allowed to use it anyway, if he can at least come up with a good enough reason." Cliff replied at Fayt's deep sigh.

"Anyway guys," Maria said, "let's just go and explain everything to the Queen."

With that the group headed towards the audience room in the great hall.

By the time that the group had explained the entire situation to the Queen it was well into the night. The Queen was looking thoughtful afterwards and then. Her face seemed so expressionless, but everyone knew that her thought was filled with grief.

Magistrate Lassele spoke up refusing to believe this insanity, "You say you're from another world. You ask us to believe this? Nonsense! Stop wasting Her Majesty's time!"

The queen spoke up for the first time in few hours. "Silence, Lasselle."

"Your Majesty!" Lasselle sounded quite shocked at being spoken to so rudely by the Queen.

Suddenly Maria spoke up again. "I understand your surprise, but what we speak is the truth."

"This is quite sudden, not to mention quite difficult to believe. However, recent events in our country leave us with no choice but to believe." The Queen still sounded like she wanted to believe this was all a bad dream.

"Your Majesty," Nel spoke up, "these people can be trusted. I believe they are telling the truth."

"We know Lady Nel. We have already put a great deal of trust in both Master Fayt and Sir Lucifer and they have yet to prove our trust false. And...you say this new enemy will return again? Why would that be?"

At that Fat spoke up, sounding sad. "I think that I am their objective."

To that, the Queen looked very surprised. "So," she says, "you are the cause of this entire affair?"

"I don't want to believe it myself." Fayt said, "But yes."

"Then all we have to do is hand you over to them! Then they will go home, no?" Lasselle had come to an obvious but quite primitive conclusion and had stated it out loud. The craziness of the story had obviously had some dramatic effect on him.

"Lasselle," the Queen said, "you are to remain silent!"

"Your Majesty..." he quickly bowed his head and obeyed the order.

"Can we fight these...Vendeeni with our Thunder Arrow?"

"I can't be sure, but I believe so. The Thunder Arrow would divert the Vendeeni long enough for us to leave the planet...and fix this situation." Fayt confessed honestly.

The queen sighed and thought for a moment before she spoke again, "For the sake of our country," she started, "it might indeed be best to simply hand you over to them." taking in a deep breath, she continued. "However, you are our guest and have helped our kingdom out a great deal. It would not be proper for us to abandon you now."

"Your Majesty," Nel exclaimed "you mean--?"

"Yes. We shall let you use the Thunder Arrow." Was her answer.

"Your Majesty, thank you very much!" Fayt spoke up again.

"We are grateful, Your Majesty." Said Maria.

"Yeah that's great guys," Cliff started, "but what are you gonna do about the range problem? It's not much good to us if we can't reach them."

"Yeah, I know." Fayt answered, crossing his arms and starting to think.

"That's just the next problem to conquer then isn't it?" Lucifer said. It's easier said than done.

Suddenly a shout could be heard from the entrance of the hall.

"We've got a problem!!!" a female soldier came running in, sounding scared beyond all reason.

"Watch your tone! You are in the presence of Her Majesty, the Queen!" Lasselle snapped at the soldier. Who didn't even react to the magistrate's word, but instead immediately yelled out her next sentence.

"Someone has infiltrated Kaddan!"

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what did you think? please leave a review telling me.  



	14. Travel through the secret path

Disclaimer: I don't own Star Ocean or any of it's charachters. i'm simply borrowing them for my own ideas.

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Chapter 14: Travel through the secret path:

"Someone has infiltrated Kaddan!"

At the words of the soldier everyone in the room fell silent for a second. The Aquarians and Lucifer knew exactly what it meant if an enemy had infiltrated Kaddan. Kaddan was the sacred temple of Apris. According to what Lucifer had read about it, Kaddan was a fortress in itself and was protected by powerful magic and guardians alike. And besides that there were always soldiers posted there as well. Even Aeryglyph had never dared attack Kaddan.

"What!?" Lasselle yelled at the man.

"Who?" the Queen asked.

The Soldier quickly bowed onto one knee and spoke, "It was one of those Celestial Ships, Your Majesty. They have landed right next to the shrine. The troops inside the Shrine believe that they are headed for the Sacred Orb. We have just received word from them by carrier Pigeon."

"The Sacred Orb?" the Queen repeated, fear evident in her voice. Lucifer didn't really know what exactly the Sacred Orb was. He had read a mention of it somewhere but so far he had only been reading about the recent happenings of the country and the villages and town's of the country. Most of the books about the religion of Apris he still hadn't read.

"According to the report, they wear strange armor and use glowing weapons. It seems that the Runologists have them stopped for the moment, but they are powerless against those weapons. At this rate they'll reach the Sacred Orb in no time!" the soldier quickly finished his report. "Glowing weapons." Maria looked like she was thinking for a moment.

"Those would be disruptor Rifles. They must be remnants of the Vendeeni fleet."

"In that case, why are they going after the Orb instead of us?" Cliff asked.

"What's Kaddan?" Fayt asked, "And what's this Sacred Orb?" he added.

"From what I know, Kaddan is a sacred area for the Church of Apris. Even Aeryglyph has never attacked Kaddan before. It's a strong temple and according to some of the books it's been made as a fortress as well as a temple. It's difficult for an army to overcome Kaddan and there are rumors about powerful enchantments that also protect it from evil." Lucifer answered Fayt's first question. "But I don't know what the Sacred Orb is either. I didn't read anything about that."

"Yes," Nel replied. "Kaddan is the holy land of our Church. It is where the Sacred Orb is enshrined--a mysterious sphere that emits the purest light. Holy water flows freely from it. It is said that in the hands of Aquaria's ruler, the Orb is capable of all kinds of miracles. The water of this lake which surrounds Aquios also come from the Sacred Orb.

"Hmm..." Maria again looked like she was in deep thoughts. "You Majesty, which way is Kaddan?"

"To the east of Aquios...".

With that Maria kneeled down and pulled some strange device out of a pocket of her coat. She started pressing buttons on it as she held it to the east. _'What's she doing?'_ Lucifer thought.

"I see." Maria mumbled to herself as the device started making beeping noises. Maria gave a wave to Mirage to join her on the ground. As soon as Mirage saw what was on the holographic screen she had a look of surprise mend on her face.

"What in the world?" she exclaimed. "What is it?" Cliff asked.

Maria looked up from her screen as she answered. "I'm picking up an energy reading in the location you described that is too technologically advanced for this planet...It's even beyond our ability to identify."

"What?" Fayt exclaimed. _'Beyond their ability to identify? What does that mean?'_ Lucifer thought.

"Maybe it's a so-called 'Out-of-Place Artifact,'" Maria said, "an OPA. I would bet that they detected this reading while they were searching for us."

"What does that mean?" Lucifer asked, not quite knowing what she was talking about.

"Throughout history" Mirage told him, "there have been cases of people who were traveling through space that found items that were too advanced to be on a planet. Those things were called OPA's. Because they are Artifacts that shouldn't be there. And also… anyone who has found an OPA has always been able to obtain incredible power."

"So you think that they're after the Sacred Orb?" Nel asked, looking at Mirage.

"It's the most likely explanation." Maria said. "Just like Mirage said, if you look back at history, anyone who got their hands on OPA has acquired incredible power. It would pretty much go without saying they'd want it."

"That's terrible!" Lasselle exclaimed. "We can't let them steal our Sacred Orb! Your Majesty, we must send soldiers immediately!" there was a clear sound of panic in his voice as he spoke.

The Queen spoke up. "Yes, you are right Lasselle. We shall send soldiers right away. Lady Nel, Sir Adray and Sir Lucifer. Take your units and make for Kaddan at once. I am sorry to ask this of you Sir Lucifer, but We are in need of your skills right now."

"Of course, Your Majesty. I'll leave at once." Lucifer answered and as one he, Adray and Nel left to leave the room. They stopped when Fayt suddenly spoke up. "Please wait a moment, Your Majesty."

"We are sorry," the Queen said, "but we must attend to your business later. Responding to these thieves at Kaddan must take precedence."

"I know that." Fayt said, not looking at the Queen or Lasselle, but rather staring at the ground in front of him. "I don't think Aquaria's military could stand up to them with their current equipment. I know that Adray, Nel and Lucifer are great fighters but they alone will not be enough to defeat the Vendeeni."

"Fayt," Lucifer spoke up, hearing Fayt's worries, "I know that the Vendeeni will be tough, but as a soldier of Aquaria, I've sworn to fight for this country. Just like I promised that I'd help you save your dad as best I can. I can't break a promise I've made, I guess it just goes against my nature."

"I know. But if you take all those soldiers with you, they'll just die. I'm the reason that the Vendeeni came here in the first place, so I'll go after them as well. Please take me with you."

"What are you thinking?" Nel said, but as she opened her mouth to continue, she was interrupted by Cliff.

"I agree. Why are you suddenly going all selfish on me? We crashed here and that's what made the Vendeeni come here. So I'm going with you, you are not going there alone. Or were you planning on going there and taking all the fun away?"

"He's right." Maria said, "Going alone will be suicidal. If you die, then I've come here for nothing. I'm going to, to make sure that you'll survive."

"Thank you" Nel said.

"Very well. Then we shall leave it to you." The Queen said as everyone was preparing to leave.

"Your Majesty, we will leave immediately for Kaddan." Nel said.

"Yes. Please do." The Queen said. She looked like she was in deep thought and she spoke up again. "As the situation in grave," She began, with a heavy voice "We give you permission to use the Sealed Cavern. Show them the way."

"Sealed Cavern?" Lucifer had never heard of a place like that. By the look on Nel's face, neither had she. Adray looked like he had remembered something.

"The Sealed Cavern," Adray said, "is a secret passageway to Kaddan, the use of which is only allowed to the Royal family."

"Yes, it is." The Queen said, "But I'm making an exception. ...Do not fail us. The priestess in the Chapel will tell you how to reach it"

"Your Majesty!" Nel quickly bowed and left, the rest of the group going with her.

"So, how long will this route take us?" Maria asked.

"Normally a trip to Kaddan would take almost a week with a carriage around the lake. But this passage runs directly under the lake, it'll only take us about a 3 or 4 hours tops." Adray explained. "The lake isn't exactly a perfect circle form. Kaddan is build on the other side of the lake, but it's only about 5 or 6 kilometers away as the birds fly. In the other directions, the lake is almost 30 kilometers wide. The lake also isn't as deep as you would think. It's 'only' about 500 meters deep."

"I see. That way, we should be able to come up to them quickly enough to handle the Vendeeni. And how big is Kaddan itself? Would we take a long time to reach the Orb?" Maria said.

"I don't know. I've only heard about the Sealed Cavern a few times before. I know that it hasn't been used for the longest time and no one knows where we'll actually enter in Kaddan. If we end up on the wrong side of Kaddan we would lose almost an entire day just trying to reach the Sacred Orb." Adray said, taking a break from running as they had just entered the Chapel. Nel walked to the main Priestess to ask about the Sealed Cavern.

As Nel was talking to the priestess, receiving instructions on how to enter the Cavern a Maid came running in, holding a few bags that were made to be carried on the back.

"These contain some food for your trip." She explained. "Most of the food is dried so it won't rot and be lighter to carry. The bags are a designed to not bother you too much when traveling and fighting." She explained, as she handed every one of them a small bag.

Just as she was done explaining they heard a loud noise coming from the center of the room. Looking around they saw that a big staircase had suddenly appeared in the middle of the chapel.

"This is the entrance to the Sealed Cavern." Nel explained, shouldering her bag. "Let's go."

With that everyone went down the staircase, entering the cave.

As Adray had predicted, after 4 hours Lucifer and everyone else had reached the Shrine of Kaddan. There were no real difficulties traveling through the Sealed Cavern, except for the lack of good quality air, because the place had been sealed for so long.

About half an hour after entering the Shrine, Lucifer and the other saw the first proof of the Vendeeni having been here. On the ground lay a group of soldiers, all of them killed.

"What has happened here?" Nel said. Her voice was shaking, sounding afraid and shocked. "Who could have done this?" she asked.

No-one answered her question; everyone was too stunned to speak. Looking around, Lucifer noticed that there was hardly any blood around. It didn't do much to reduce the gravity of the scene, but it showed that whoever fought these soldiers had not used weapons from this world.

"La…. dy… N…. el?" a voice suddenly sounded from the group of fallen soldiers. Looking at the group again, Lucifer saw that one of them had his head turned towards Nel. A small stream of blood was flowing from his mouth, indicating an internal injury. There were burn marks on the man's armor, along with a hole near the stomach. The wounds would not be fatal quickly, but with the time that had passed, it was already to late to save him.

As Nel ran over to the soldier, Maria looked at the scene stoically.

"This is the work of the Vendeeni. No weapon on this planet could do this kind of damage to these men without severe bloodstains." She said as she walked over too another of the bodies and crouched down, investigating the body.

"What happened to you?" Nel asked the soldier.

"Stra… nge beings…." The man tried to answer, having trouble with every word. "they us…ed some str…ange…weapon. It sh…ot light … like a suddenly the man coughed up blood. Fayt almost looked like he was going to be sick at the sight of it.

"tried to… stop the…m. our wea…pons and run…ology didn't work…. They went on… the Orb… Lady Nel… prot… ect it." With that the man's head dropped. He had died in the arms of Nel, asking her to protect the Sacred Orb.

When Nel stood up, Lucifer thought he could see the tiniest mark of a tear in her eye.

"I will." She said, her voice laced with anger, hatred and determination. "I will avenge your deaths. They will pay for this."

"Again." Fayt spoke up. "Again so many people die. Just because I'm here." He sounded like he was on the brink of tears.

"Don't fool yourself kid." Cliff suddenly spoke up, looking at Fayt. "The Vendeeni or anyone else would have eventually found these energy signals anyway. This Sacred Orb gives of a lot of energy. It only happened a little faster because they came looking for you."

"But if I weren't here, the Vendeeni wouldn't have found it. These men wouldn't have died in vain, fighting something they could never hope to defeat." Fayt yelled, almost sounding in despair.

Suddenly Adray charged forward and lifted Fayt of the ground, slamming him into a wall.

"These men did NOT die in vain!" he bellowed. "They died fighting a force they could not defeat, yes that's true. But they died for what they believed in, holding of an enemy from something they believed was important. A death like that is never in vain." And with that, as if his anger suddenly evaporated, he put Fayt back on the ground. Fayt instantly crashed down, his legs not capable of so suddenly bearing his weight. Adray turned around, looking at the men, his back still turned towards Fayt, when he suddenly spoke up again.

"Fighting and dying happens kid, life with it. A soldier knows that his life can end early, but he joins the army none the less. They join because they believe in something. Whether they want to defend their country, avenge a death or simply get into a fight, they all have a reason. A reason they think is worth risking your life for. You say you don't want too see people die, don't you? Then get up on your feet and prevent their deaths to the best of your abilities. And if they do die, remember them with honor or avenge their death. Those are the rules of a soldier in the battlefield. I don't understand everything that's been going on and I certainly don't understand all this stuff you're saying about Vendeeni and everything, but I know this. Cliff said that they would have found their way here regardless of your presence. They could have gotten here next weak, or maybe a hundred years from now, but they would have come none the less."

Suddenly Adray looked over his shoulder at Fayt with a grim face as he continued.

"Do you wish for future generations to suffer from this? They would have come later, perhaps when Nel and I are no longer on this world. Others would have fought them. And they would have died, just like these men. But with you here, we can fight these things. If you weren't here we would be hopeless. But with your knowledge of their weapons you can avenge these men. So don't mope and cry, saying you're the cause of this all. Instead if you do feel like you're responsible, take responsibility and deal with it."

Everyone was silent, waiting for Adray or Fayt to say anything. Adray was still looking at Fayt, who was now studying the ground at his feet. Nel was still standing next to the soldier that died. Maria, who was still examining a few of the other corpses, was silent as she looked at the man and the boy. Lucifer stood there, not knowing what to say, next to an equally silent Cliff.

"I suppose," Fayt said, as he looked up again. Marks of him being near tears a moment ago were still there, but everyone could also see a fire burning in his eyes again. "That's true as well. So I'll go and defeat the Vendeeni, no matter what! I'll make them pay for what they did." With that he walked to the closest of the bodies, the one at Adray's feet. He spoke again as he crouched down, closing the eyes of the woman with a soft sweep of his hand.

"I'm sorry for insulting you like that." He said, his voice still as determent as before. "You're deaths were not in vain and I'm sorry for saying such things. May you rest in peace, knowing that we will avenge you and your comrades. I'll make the Vendeeni pay for this. Even if it means I'll die myself, they will pay!"

"You know that we'll help you, right Fayt?" said Cliff. His voice was also serious. "Whatever comes, we've been through too much trouble to give up on you now. Anyway." with that he turned to Maria "Maria, have you managed to find out anything about the weapons they've used?"

"Yes." Her answer came. "Judging from the lack of damage to the surrounding area and lack of blood, along with the burn marks inside the wounds, I'd say the Vendeeni are indeed using Disrupter Rifles. This would mean that, most likely, they're carrying Disrupter Guns as well. It'll be tricky to fight them, but if should be far from impossible."

With that Maria turned towards the door, hand already on the doorknob when she said,

"Well, let's go then. The longer we bigger the advantage of the Vendeeni gets."

And with that, the entire group left and went through the door, continuing on their way..

However big the shock of seeing the soldier die was, Lucifer managed to find some form of sick relieve and bigger shock in the next room. Like all other rooms in the Shrine this room was big and high, with a few decorations standing near the walls. It was, however, the center of the room and the southern wall that drew everyone's attention. Next to the southern wall there lay a body with a big hole in the chest and in the center there was another body with a squashed head and torso.

Lucifer got the small sense of satisfaction from the fact that the bodies were not those of Elicoorians. No, these body's were cleanly Vendeeni and there guns were damaged just as badly as their bodies. Near the body in the center of the room was another strange thing. Laying there was a small pile of small Crystals. And there was something buried underneath them, but it was unclear what it was. With the distance that laid between the crystal pile and the group, it looked like an Orb.

"I wonder what happened here." Cliff said as he walked closer to the body against the south wall. "I don't think that soldiers could have done this kind of damage. Breaking through their armor AND their bones like this requires a hell lot of strength. And the size of this hole is bigger then any hand-held weapon I know off."

"I have no idea." Lucifer said as he walked closer to the second body and the pile of crystals. "But what on earth would have happened to this guy?" with that Lucifer crouched down to get a better look at the Vendeeni's body, examining his head. He didn't notice the small shock going through the crystals. "It looks like there's a hoof imprinted on his head. It almost looks like a horse or a lum stepped on his head."

"Look out!" Lucifer heard Adray yell as a large shadow suddenly towered over him. Looking up he saw a giant crystal horse about to stamp on his head. Reacting quickly, Lucifer jumped back just in time to evade the horse's hoofs. As Lucifer landed he stayed crouched down, a hand on his katana's hilt, ready to draw his sword. Behind and around him, everyone else also got ready for a fight. Taking a better look, Lucifer saw that this opponent wasn't just a horse. It looked like the crystal's that were lying on the floor had come to live and formed a body to fight with. The lower half, that had nearly crushed Lucifer, was indeed the form of a horse. The top half however looked like a human, wielding a giant crystal shield and lance instead of it's hands. In the center of the Human part's chest there was a blue Orb, shining.

"I guess this is what happened to the Vendeeni then." Maria said. "But if they've destroyed it, why did it restore so quickly?" before anyone could even begin a speculation on what happened, the crystal centaur charged at Maria. Not being used to quick action in close combat, Maria hardly had time to react as the centaur charged. Fayt quickly pushed her aside as he too, jumped away and drew his sword.

"Maria!" Cliff yelled as he charged towards the centaur, ready to deliver a powerful punch. "Got it!" she yelled back as she pulled her laser gun and begin firing to cover Cliff. However her gun shot laser beams, which were made of light. The centaur, being made out of crystal didn't face as the lasers were reflected of his skin and redirected towards Cliff and Nel.

"Watch wear you're firing will you." Cliff yelled as he had to take an awkward position, having raised both of his arms above his head and spread his legs, as if he were being interrogated by the police, to show that there were holes in the wall just above his head and below his crotch. There was one shot that didn't get reflected, but instead made contact with the Orb on the centaur's chest. It made a small crack instead of reflecting.

When Maria had stopped firing Lucifer and Fayt quickly charged in, preparing to attack the centaur from both sides at once. The massive beast simply raised his shield to block Fayt and swung his lance, trying to hit Lucifer with it. He quickly ducked underneath the lance and prepared to attack, but saw the centaur change directions. The beast turned his head towards him, nearly slamming his horse side into Fayt who had just jumped away, and prepared so slam the crystal shield into Lucifer's torso. Suddenly a spike erupted from the ground, blocking both the shield and the lance from the crystal centaur. "Now Lucifer," Adray yelled, "That orb is the only weakness, hit it!" Lucifer didn't need to be told twice, he instantly slammed the handle of his blade into the crack that Maria had already made. The force of the impact on the already weakened Orb instantly shattered it. Almost as fast, the centaur itself fell apart as well.

"What was that thing?" Maria asked, as soon as she was sure that the coast was clear.

"It was one of the guardians of Kaddan" Adray answered. "Long ago, when Aquaria and Airyglyph were one, the kingdom of Aquor, by Apris's divine power these guardians were made. They could not die of age, hunger or thirst. These beings are one of the reasons that no enemy has ever dared enter Kaddan. But if there is danger these things will attack anyone that has not received Apris's blessing."

"And what exactly is that Apris's blessing thing then?" Cliff asked

"It's a special mark given by the Holy Mother or one of the other representatives of Apris. It requires a grand ceremony of about 4 hours, but afterwards those who have received the mark can enter Kaddan freely. And according to legends the guardians will also obey the commands of those who can give the markings. But besides the Holy Mother, who is also the Queen, no other representatives of Apris have been seen for many years." Adray continued.

"So," Fayt said, "These things are out to kill us AND the Vendeeni?" After receiving a confirming nod from Adray he continued, "But how did they get past this thing? From the looks of it, he made a few victims but they didn't destroy it."

"Most likely" Nel spoke up, "they didn't defeat this guardian at all. You said that they used weapons similar to Maria's no? They had almost no effect on the guardian so I assumed that they fled, leaving these few behind to distract it."

"You're probably right Nel. Let's go, we still have to get to the Sacred Orb" Fayt said, sheathing his sword as everyone continued on to the next room.

About half an hour later, they still had not encountered any resistance, or any traces of either the Vendeeni or more Guardians. It was then that the party entered a room where they saw a similar image to the room of the first guardian. A Vendeeni soldier lay on the floor, slain with a huge hole in his abdomen. Again there lay a small pile of crystals in the center of the room, indicating that there was another guardian here.

"Another Guardian room." Cliff said, "Let's try to get through here before that thing wakes up, maybe we won't have to do any trouble."

Almost as soon as he finished talking however, the pile of crystals jumped up to form another centaur guardian. Without pause it immediately charged towards the group.

"Shit!" Cliff exclaimed as he leaped aside to prepare a pincer attack with Lucifer and Fayt, who had both unsheathed their weapons.

"I'll handle this thing" Maria suddenly said as she raised her gun to eye level and took aim at the charging guardian.

"But didn't your shots get reflect…"

"Scatter Beam!" Fayt was cut of as suddenly Maria's gun shot. But instead of 1 light beam there were 5 beams that looked more like solid then the one she had fired at the previous Guardian. 3 of the beams directly hit the core and destroyed it, while the other 2 instead hit the exposed body of the Guardian. Unlike last time though, this time the beam didn't get reflected, but simply hit the being.

"What was that? I've never heard of a Pulse gun shooting like that!" Fayt exclaimed.

"I know. And you'll never find another gun that can do that, unless I'm wielding it." As she looked at Fayt's confused look she continued, "It's the power that your father gave me, the power that allows me to change the structure of matter. If I focus my power on my gun, before I fire, then I can change the effect it has. I can change the type of round fired, how it's fired, whether or not it's explosive or piercing. It can be quite useful, especially in situations like this."

"Sounds pretty nice" Lucifer remarked, before they continued to the next room.

The next room, however, was anything but nice. As they enter they saw yet another guardian standing ready to fight. There were however a few differences this time around. The first thing that everyone noticed was that this guardian was black, instead of see-through like the others. It's core a faint purple instead of the clear blue. The other thing was that this guardian, unlike the others, was already standing when the group entered the room. The room itself was designed like a long, thin hallway. There were 4 Vendeeni bodies lying on various points in this hall, al showed that the Vendeeni had died terrible deaths. The black centaur turned towards the group and apparently was preparing to charge at them, from halfway across the hall.

"We'll deal with this guy the same as we did with that last one." Maria calmly said she once again took aim with her gun. Again she exclaimed the name of her attack as she send 5 beams flying towards the centaur, expecting to have defeated it.

The centaur didn't go down that easy. In fact, none of the beams even managed to hit the core. The black guardian had instead raised its massive shield to take the attack. It looked more like a knight in one of the old knight tournaments that Fayt sometimes saw in movies then anything else.

"Damn." Maria said as she too quickly jumped aside. Everyone had drawn their weapons and scattered, preparing to attack the giant knight from many different sides. Looking around, the centaur made a quick dash towards Nel, who instantly fell into a defensive stance. The guardian didn't reveal the orb once during its charge always keeping it's shield in front of it, so instead of attacking, Nel waited until the last second and quickly jumped aside, causing the black mass of crystal to crash into a wall.

"This is bad." She said. "It doesn't reveal it's weakness until the final second before its attack. It'll be hard to penetrate its defense with that crystal shield."

"That thing looks like it's made out of diamond or something and if that's true breaking its shield would be practically impossible. Even for me." Cliff said.

"I'll Try" Adray said and quickly slammed his (still sheathed) sword into the ground exclaiming "Earth Glaive." Again a spike shut up from the ground towards the crystal centaur, but it simply raised its shield. The spike hit the shield hard, but the only effect it seemed to have, was that the guardian was forced back a few centimeters. It quickly turned around and charged for Adray, again shielding its Core with the shield on its left arm.

"We've got to find a way past his Shield" Lucifer said. "If we can get past it, we have a shot at destroying the core."

"I have an idea, but I'll need both of you to help me." Cliff said, looking at Fayt and Lucifer.

"What is it?" Fayt said, as Adray quickly jumped aside on the other side of the room, dodging the spear of the centaur. Nel quickly launched a Runological spell towards it, while Maria took a few shots at it. Neither of the attacks seemed to have much of an effect.

"If you to can try to force an opening on this thing, I can come in and destroy the core in 1 hit. I've got a move just for occasions like this." Cliff explained. "Push his shield aside and, if possible, his spear. I'll come in and destroy his core"

"Right" Lucifer and Fayt both exclaimed as they crouched down and shot of, charging at the guardian centaur.

"Hey Horse-boy, over here" Lucifer shouted as they ran, drawing the attention of the centaur. He turned towards them and charged as well. They were quickly nearing each other; Fayt running on Lucifer's left, heading straight towards the Centaur's spear. Looking at each other, Fayt and Lucifer gave a quick nod, accepting the unspoken plan.

As the Centaur neared, it took a quick lung at Fayt, who suddenly jumped back, going in completely the opposite direction as before. The sudden change in position of Fayt caused the Centaur to miss. Missing its attack caused the centaur lose his balance for a second. That second was all that Lucifer needed as he quickly pushed the flat side of his sword to the lance. Using the speed he had gained from the charge he pushed it to the Centaur's side, clearing one of the Guardian's weapons. Fayt quickly came up and pushed his sword between the shield and the Centaur's Torso, used it as a wig. With a grunt and powerful push, Fayt managed to clear the Shield away, revealing the core of the Centaur.

"Now Cliff!" Fayt yelled.

"Fiery Tackle!" Cliff exclaimed. He pushed of with such force that the ground that he was standing upon was cracked instantly. As he kept running he kept going faster and faster.

He was moving so fast it almost looked like he was a ball of fire. It took Cliff only 2 seconds to cross the entire room's distance. As he reached the Centaur, he suddenly came to a stop and he immediately send his right fist forward. The velocity that he had gained while running added to the speed and power of the punch and as soon as Cliff's fist made contact with the centaur's core, it was shattered to tiny bits. As with the other two the black guardian instantly fell apart when his core was destroyed, but the speed and power behind Cliff's punch caused the crystal pieces to be shot backwards, along with Fayt and Lucifer.

"Gotcha!" Cliff exclaimed as the black centaur exploded.

* * *

A/N: I can't believe it's been so long since my last update(well over a year now…). Actually I have had this chapter ready for quite some time now, but because of a series of problems for both my Beta-readers and myself, I could not finish this chapter. The game script FAQ I was using also lacked the entire section that this chapter was at so I had to improvise a lot of it. Thankfully Illusionsky, one of my two beta's was able to get me quite a bit of the lines told in the conversation with the queen. Unfortunately, she was not able to get me the lines of the soldier's death scene and because my own PS2 has major problems(it simply refuses to play SO3) I had to make that scene up completely. I hope you like what I've done with it.

On another note, because both IllusionSky and ThrogmortenMimic are currently incapable of beta-reading, due to personal reasons, I would like to ask for a third Beta reader.

And on yet anther note, I have been writing more fanfics these days, one of Bleach(a one-shot, already posted) and I've been working on a very large, Multi-chapter Dragonball Z story, featuring Gohan and Videl. I've been looking for a Beta for that story as well. So if you're interested and you've got the free time, please let me know through a review or a PM.

Thanks for reading to all my ramblings. I hope that the next chapter will come forth a little quicker. Anyway, please review. All feedback is welcome.


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